Selecting/Development of the iGEM team

Students heard about iGEM early on in both first and second year biotechnology. Mr. Cachianes told his students early on on what his criteria for selecting students for iGEM was: active participation, a keen eye for detail, organization, a maturity and an ability to work with adults, responsible, and a love for science. He wanted his students to be aggressive, and he wanted them to tell him personally if they expressed an interest in iGEM. Later on in the year, he passed around a clipboard in class, and those students that wanted to be on the team wrote down their names on the clipboard. From that list of names, Mr. Cachianes used his personal judgement to select those students he thought would work best together as a team and could work independently in a lab.