FDA Releases New Agricultural Biotechnology Curriculum for Middle and High School Students
Constituent Update
February 25, 2021
Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is announcing the availability of Science and Our Food Supply: Exploring Food Agriculture and Biotechnology, a new, free and online supplemental curriculum for middle and high school students on the science behind genetically engineered plants.
This curriculum is the latest release of the FDA’s award-winning supplemental curriculum series Science and Our Food Supply. Through labs, activities, and interactive discussions, the curriculum aims to help teachers instruct middle and high school students about traditional and modern agricultural methods, with a focus on genetic engineering and genome editing techniques that are used to produce foods commonly called “GMOs.” Many of the biotechnology topics addressed in this new curriculum are the same as those addressed in the FDA’s “Feed Your Mind” consumer education initiative launched in March 2020.
Science-based lesson plans are mapped to numerous National Education Standards for science, agriculture, health, Common Core English literacy, Common Core math, and social studies and can be taught in-person or utilizing the many platforms teachers are using virtually with students.
Funding for Science and Our Food Supply: Exploring Food Agriculture and Biotechnology was provided by Congress in the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2017 to conduct “consumer outreach and education regarding agricultural biotechnology and biotechnology derived food products and animal feed, including through publication and distribution of science-based educational information on the environmental, nutritional, food safety, economic, and humanitarian impacts of such biotechnology, food products, and feed.” Additional funds were provided through 2018 and 2019 Appropriations bills.
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