Useful Genetics with Professor Rosie Redfield

Key Takeaways

genetics is everywhere all of a sudden it's in their newspapers it's on TV it's in your doctor's office it's in the medicines that were suggested to take it's in the legal system the immigration system it's even in your shampoo this new world of genetics raises a whole new world of questions should I believe the headlines how can I find out if they're telling the truth is this genetic test actually going to help improve my health how much do I want to know about my own genes are there things I'd rather not know am i risk of something like breast cancer because someone else in my family has it I'm doctor Rosie Redfield I'm a professor at the University of British Columbia and I'm here to tell you about our new course useful genetics as the name implies this isn't a course that's going to trained professional geneticists this is a university level course that aims to teach ordinary people the genetics that they will actually use at the core of the course would be short weekly videos explaining the key topics and links to other online resources that students can use now genetics is a very challenging topic you can't learn it just by watching videos you need to really work with the material and so along with each week's videos there will be self test questions but more importantly there also be weekly homework assignments with challenging genetics problems for students to wrestle with to help them pull together all the different components of genetics that need to be integrated and interrelated there may be a couple of quizzes maybe a written assignment or two and definitely a final exam at the end of the course you'll have a solid understanding of genetics principles this understanding you'll be able to apply not only to the genetic issues that are coming up today but to the new issues that are going to continue to arise in the future in this new world of genetics