PERSPECTIVE article
Front. Educ.
Sec. STEM Education
Volume 10 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/feduc.2025.1640703
This article is part of the Research TopicImmunology Education: In the Classroom and BeyondView all 7 articles
A multi-pronged approach to addressing curricular challenges in undergraduate immunology education
Provisionally accepted
- 1Macalester College Department of Biology, Saint Paul, United States
- 2Hamilton College Department of Biology, Clinton, United States
- 3Carleton College Program in Environmental Studies, Northfield, United States
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Immunology is typically offered as a single-semester course in non-immunology-focused graduate programs and as a module within foundational sciences or microbiology courses in conventional allopathic medical education. Undergraduate courses in immunology are frequently stand-alone upper-level lecture courses without an accompanying laboratory, and often leave students overwhelmed by the complicated molecular cascades and cell subsets. This creates a barrier for immune literacy among biology students, and students at large, all of whom are nonetheless impacted by the workings of their immune system every day, and stand to benefit from understanding how it functions. We addressed this barrier with a multi-pronged approach of elective immunology courses, first-year seminars, a majors’ survey course with a skills-based lab, advanced topical seminars, and an inquiry-based immunological research methods course. In this perspective article, we share our pedagogical practices to enhance immune literacy across all levels of a liberal arts and biology curriculum. Students can take one, several, or all of these courses during their undergraduate studies to build and bolster their understanding of immune systems and address the crucial need for increased scientific and immune literacy.
Keywords: Immunology education, undergraduate students, liberal arts, Undergraduate research, immune literacy, Active learning & teaching methodologies
Received: 04 Jun 2025; Accepted: 14 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tonc and Chatterjea. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Elena Tonc, Macalester College Department of Biology, Saint Paul, United States
Devavani Chatterjea, Carleton College Program in Environmental Studies, Northfield, United States
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.