The Pursuit of Competence: Why our students need more meaningful challenges, not less.
The Leiden Academic Centre for Drug Research (LACDR) is closely connected to the education of our biopharmaceutical students, providing both courses and immersive internship projects. Among these is the Bachelor Research Project (BOO), which offers many students their first real scientific experience and plays a crucial role in shaping their understanding of research.
This year, guided by Micha Drukker, seven BOO students tried to advance the development of a zebrafish model for Bohring-Opitz Syndrome (BOS), building on the pioneering efforts of previous BOO students. Like last year, some of their progress was highlighted at an international research symposium hosted in the United States.
“The last two months have been extremely intensive and challenging, not just for the students, but for everyone in our group,” shares Rafaella Buzatu, a PhD-candidate in Micha’s group. “We chose to offer the students a small computational component in the project, because it’s increasingly important to have some basic computational skills in life sciences. That meant a lot of hands-on time from all of us teaching them to work with stuff like AlphaFold3, ChimeraX and Haddock, on top of the lab-training and the journal clubs we planned to help the students learn to read and interpret scientific literature.”
AlphaFold3, an AI-based tool for predicting protein structures, ChimeraX, an interactive visualization and analysis system, and Haddock, a software for molecular docking, are cutting-edge tools that enhance our research capabilities. Students faced a steep learning curve but ultimately gained valuable skills that are highly relevant in modern biological research. This approach matches the multidisciplinary nature of our research institute, as well as the educational values of the group. Group leader Micha – professor of Stem Cell Technology at LACDR – emphasizes, "We strongly believe in offering a meaningful scientific challenge. We encourage students to think, come up with questions, and plan their experiments together with our PhD students and support staff, but with considerable autonomy. These things are not trivial; this allows them to engage in meaningful research at the frontier of our understanding of science. Our versatile, challenging approach aims to let students develop their scientific interests and personalities."
Supporting the research group in the organization and supervision of these students are also three of last year’s students. “I really enjoyed this BOO project last year, and when I heard that our pilot-study was being continued and even expanded, I offered to help,” tells Noëlle, who now started a master’s in science communication. “Something I discovered this year, however, is my affinity with teaching. Working with the students energized me and made me realize I want to discover how I can weave education into my career path.”
Providing truly immersive and meaningful learning experiences can be challenging for all parties involved. We asked several of these students about their experience. “The hardest challenge was to match expectations when being given a lot of freedom during the BOO. This was especially hard in the first weeks,” Grady says. “But I’ve gained a lot of independence as a researcher and learned how to communicate and work together in a research group.”
“One of the biggest challenges while working on this project was the need for optimization,” Tamara added. “None of the experiments went the way I wanted them to and, although it was frustrating at times, I really learned a lot about optimization of different techniques.”
Setbacks are common but valuable learning experiences in scientific research. However, due to educational limitations such as time constraints, personnel shortages, and limited lab space, our program often tries to protect students from having to deal with experimental setbacks. While this approach is understandable and might even be beneficial for students during the bachelor's program, it can also set unrealistic expectations for future careers in science. Joey Zuijdervelt, a PhD-candidate in his first year explains that Micha’s group tries to expose students to realities and stressors of real-life research, but in a controlled environment. “I noticed that many students feel very overwhelmed very easily, and that’s an issue we must address. Instead of sheltering them and making it easier, I proposed to take a different approach: to set high expectations and give students more responsibility over their projects, as a sort of exposure therapy,” he adds. “I believe our students are much more capable than they’re often given credit for, and only by challenging them sufficiently, we allow them grow. It took a few weeks, but then the students really took charge of their progress, both individually and as a group.”
Shania, also a BOO student, tells us, “I developed problem-solving abilities, particularly in optimizing protocols and troubleshooting experimental issues. I learned to think critically and creatively to overcome obstacles and improve our methodologies.” As another student highlighted, “This whole process has brought me many insights on how a real research project works. I believe my supervisors gave me a lot of responsibility and I enjoyed being able to give my own input on the project. I found the project so exciting that I now know for sure that I want to pursue a career in this field.” Grady adds to this, “My peers and supervisors have helped me through the stressful times, but we have also celebrated the wins together. The BOO was quite a stressful time with a lot of learning moments, so it was really nice to not go through it alone. The supervisors have given me a realistic idea of what work as a researcher / PhD-candidate is like, helping me to set correct expectations for myself and my future career.”
hile the journey has had its share of struggles and stress, it’s also been marked by meaningful celebrations. These moments of success have not only strengthened the connections within the group, but also expanded the growing network of these young scientists. Several students have already expressed interest in returning for another internship in the Drukker Group during their Master's program. We are excited to see what they will achieve during this upcoming 9-month internship, as they continue to grow and contribute to the field of biomedical research.
