title: Non-stop lab week: A real laboratory experience for life sciences postgraduate courses.
abstract: At the Portuguese universities, practical classes of life sciences are usually professor-centered 2-hour classes. This approach results in students underprepared for a real work environment in a research/clinical laboratory. To provide students with a real-life laboratory environment, the Non-Stop Lab Week (NSLW) was created in the Molecular Biomedicine master program at the University of Aveiro, Portugal. The unique feature of the NSLW is its intensity: during a 1-week period, students perform a subcloning and a protein expression project in an environment that mimics a real laboratory. Students work autonomously, and the progression of work depends on achieving the daily goals. Throughout the three curricular years, most students considered the intensity of the NSLW a very good experience and fundamental for their future. Moreover, after some experience in a real laboratory, students state that both the techniques and the environment created in the NSLW were similar to what they experience in their current work situation. The NSLW fulfills a gap in postgraduate students' learning, particularly in practical skills and scientific thinking. Furthermore, the NSLW experience provides skills to the students that are crucial to their future research area. © 2016 by The International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, 44:297-303, 2016.
authors.affiliation: Signal Transduction Laboratory, iBiMED-Institute for Research in Biomedicine, Department of Medical Sciences, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, 3810-193, Portugal.
authors.forename: Maria João
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: Freitas
authors.affiliation: Signal Transduction Laboratory, iBiMED-Institute for Research in Biomedicine, Department of Medical Sciences, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, 3810-193, Portugal.
authors.forename: Joana Vieira
authors.initials: JV
authors.lastname: Silva
authors.affiliation: Signal Transduction Laboratory, iBiMED-Institute for Research in Biomedicine, Department of Medical Sciences, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, 3810-193, Portugal.|Department of Pathology and Experimental Therapeutics, Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona, 08907, Spain.
authors.forename: Luís
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Korrodi-Gregório
authors.affiliation: Signal Transduction Laboratory, iBiMED-Institute for Research in Biomedicine, Department of Medical Sciences, University of Aveiro, Aveiro, 3810-193, Portugal.
authors.forename: Margarida
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fardilha
mesh_terms: D001690:Biological Science Disciplines / Q000193:education*; D003479:Curriculum; D004496:Education, Continuing / Q000592:standards*; D004500:Education, Graduate / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007753:Laboratories / Q000592:standards*; D014495:Universities
keywords: postgraduate students; practical classes; practical skills; student-centered teaching