I
N THE FALL of 2021, schools in Hawai‘i and across the U.S. were still grappling with the challenges of distance learning when educators at ‘Iolani School’s Community Science ‘Āina-Informatics Network turned the teaching disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic on its head.Their idea was bold and unprecedented: Equip students with the power of genomics as the public health crisis unfolded and enable them to be part of the solution. At the time, the Hawai‘i State Department of Health (DOH) had a backlog of samples waiting to be analyzed from SARS-CoV2-positive residents swabbed at state testing sites. When the pandemic hit, Ethan Hill ’14 was a graduate student working with Dr. Marguerite Butler at the Pacific Diversity Lab at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. “We were tossing around the idea of working with COVID because it was happening and we had the molecular chops to do it,” he recalls. Hill and Butler had genetic samples from the DOH and the reagents to process them, but lacked a DNA sequencing device.They sought out Director of Community Science Dr. Yvonne Chan to ask about the possibility of using ‘Iolani’s MinION sequencer. “We actually did our first sequencing run of 12 COVID genomes in the Sullivan Lab, and we generated a pilot data set that was robust enough for the DOH to validate against their own,” says Hill. “That kicked off what would eventually become the COVID Variant Trackers Project.” Hill did the molecular heavy lifting, taking the inactivated viral RNA samples extracted by the DOH and converting them into classroom-safe DNA fragments students could run through the MinION to identify genetic variations. By counting the number of different variants and mapping them using corresponding geographic data, students monitored how the variants were spreading. Engaging 643 students at 14 schools on O‘ahu, Kaua‘i, and Hawai‘i Island, the COVID Variant Trackers Project sequenced 420 genomes. Since the genomes were being sequenced for the first time in the classrooms of partici- pating students, there was a real possibility of discovering a new variant, which heightened the sense of urgency for the high school scientists. They learned how tracking the variants could help state epidemiologists predict surges and allow for early interventions to control outbreaks. Their data was also shared with local, global, and national databases, as well as the DOH, which published the students’ numbers in its bi-weekly report about COVID variants in Hawai‘i.
“At that time, it really mattered because our vaccines were effective against Delta [variant], but they weren’t effective against Omicron [variant],”says ‘Āina-Informatics Network Coordinator Eric ‘Iwakeli‘i Tong, who collaborated with 19 teachers to demystify the genomics of coronavirus transmission and mutation. Tong explained that there was a lot of misinformation surrounding the pandemic at the time that led to vaccine hesitancy.
“Part of the project was to make the whole process visible and bring some scientific messaging and vaccine literacy to the community through the students, who were the first in their communities to know which variants were among the samples they sequenced,” he says. “These students were also learning what mRNA vaccines are and how they’re different from other vaccines.” The project, which was supported in part by a Governor’s Emergency Educational Relief Grant, also offered a launching pad to discuss the ethics surrounding the limited vaccine rollout, whether vaccines should be mandated in the workplace, and inequities in the global distribution of vaccines. “What we were doing was pretty out there for high school,” Tong says, reflecting not only on the timely impact of the students’ contributions, but also how the COVID Variant Trackers Project demonstrated the value of dynamic relationships that have bolstered the ‘Āina Informatics Network. “For our local high schools to be working in close collaboration with the Department of Health and a lab at UH in the midst of a pandemic was an unexpected but incredibly meaningful experience for the many students across our network.”
VOL.63 I NO.3 I 2025 I 41
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator