Some 200 biologists from colleges and universities in Canada and the United States are at the UO this week to enhance their educational skills for teaching in undergraduate biology laboratories.

The UO Department of Biology is host for the 36th Annual Workshop and Conference of the Association for Biology Laboratory Education (ABLE). Biology instructor Carl Stiefbold, who is this year's conference host, says the heart of the event features 21 three-hour "hands-on" workshops and 32 separate 50-minute mini-workshops designed to equip attendees with information to deploy in their lab teaching when they get home.

The full ABLE schedule kicks off with a board meeting from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday in 350 Willamette Hall and officially closes with a banquet Friday night in the EMU Ballroom. Lab-based workshops are scheduled Wednesday-Friday at various locations across campus. A variety of optional recreational activities are also available to attendees on Tuesday and Saturday.

ABLE was founded in 1979 to promote information exchange among university and college educators actively concerned with teaching biology in a laboratory setting. The focus of ABLE is to improve the undergraduate biology laboratory experience by promoting the development and dissemination of interesting, innovative and reliable laboratory exercises.

- by Jim Barlow, Public Affairs Communications