Project Lead the Way

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The Project Lead the Way (PLTW) Biomedical Sciences (BMS) Program is a completer program offered at New Town High School that allows students to take a sequence of courses in biomedical content areas. These courses follow proven, hands-on, real-world, problem-solving approaches to learning.

Through our program, students explore the concepts of human medicine and are introduced to topics such as physiology, genetics, microbiology, and public health. Exploration of these concepts prepares students for entrance into a college medical program. Through hands-on activities, such as dissecting a heart, students are able to examine the processes, structures, and interactions of the human body - often playing the role of real-world biomedical professionals as they undergo their examinations. Students also get to explore topics vital to the medical profession such as prevention, diagnosis, and treatment by working collaboratively to investigate and design innovative solutions to the real-world health challenges of the 21st century such as fighting cancer with nanotechnology and examining how to react to a global pandemic.

PLTW Biomedical Science courses do not fulfill science credits toward graduation. Rather, they are part of a completer program to give students who plan to enter the medical profession a more concentrated and hands-on preparation for those fields. While the completer program is targeted toward incoming ninth graders, tenth grade students may also enter the completer program if they are interested and able to fit the courses into their current schedule. While all students are encouraged to apply, students must have a strong interest in science and a career in forensics or medical professions to be successful in the program.

Below you will find the course sequence and a description of all of the specialized courses within our Project Lead the Way completer:

Principles of Biomedical Sciences

Students explore biology concepts through the study of human diseases engaging in activities and projects that introduce students to human physiology, medicine, and research processes necessary for success in medical fields. Students will engage in hands-on activities throughout the course, such as determining the factors that led to the death of a fictional person by investigating the lifestyle choices and medical treatments that might have prolonged the fictional person's life.


Human Body Systems

In this course students examine the interactions of human body systems as they explore identity, power, movement, protection, and homeostasis. Students design experiments, investigate the structures and functions of the human body, and use data acquisition software to monitor body functions such as muscle movement, reflex, and voluntary action and respiration.


Medical Interventions

Students investigate a variety of interventions involved in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of disease as they follow the life of a fictitious family. Students explore how to prevent and fight infection; screen and evaluate the code in human DNA; prevent, diagnose and treat cancer; and prevail when the organs of the body begin to fail.


Biomedical Innovation

Students design innovative solutions for the health challenges of the 21st century. They work through the progressively challenging open-ended problems, addressing topics such as clinical medicine, physiology, biomedical engineering, and public health. They have the opportunity to work on an independent project with a mentor or advisor from a university, hospital, research institution, or the biomedical industry.

Questions? Contact Ms. Stephanie Cratic-McDaniel, PLTW Program Coordinator ([email protected])