Joint BCIT-UBC Program Trains for Dynamic Biotech Careers

THE BRITISH COLUMBIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (BCIT), TOGETHER WITH THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (UBC), offers a unique joint five-year Honours B.Sc. degree in Biotechnology. Since 2001, this program has been instrumental in providing graduates that have contributed to the growth of the blossoming biotechnology industry in Canada.

“This is quite rare from Canada, and probably globally, to have this inter-post-secondary partnership for a degree,” says Sarah McLeod, head of BCIT’s Biotechnology Program in Burnaby.

Students complete one year at UBC in general science before transferring to BCIT for two years of very intense, hands-on technical training with a small-sized cohort group. Then they transfer back to UBC for their final two years, she explains.

Students also gain valuable co-op work experience, often in the same field as they will embark on in their career after graduation.

Many students begin their careers with local companies and work in highly skilled and specialized fields such as lipid nanoparticle (LNP) technology, and monoclonal antibody therapeutics.

Ada Leung graduated with an Honours B.Sc. degree from the joint BCIT-UBC biotechnology program in 2011. She is now a project and alliance manager with Genevant Sciences Corporation in Vancouver, a leading company in LNP-mediated nucleic acid drug delivery.

Leung says the two study programs complemented each other. The BCIT component provided more practical experience that helped prepare her for the real work environment. The UBC portion of the course focused more on the theoretical experience, and taught how to develop critical thinking skills.

“I particularly valued the co-op experience, which is mandatory for the program, because that really launched my career. It also helped me build a network,” says Leung.

“The other aspect of the BCIT biotechnology program I really enjoyed is how broad it is. We’re not focused in just one avenue of science. It teaches you about accounting, business administration, marketing and regulatory affairs. So you get a more holistic view of what the industry is like,” she adds.

The joint BCIT-UBC program also helped Leung figure out which aspects of the science/medical/biotechnology fields she did and did not want to develop in her career.

The BCIT-UBC partnership illustrates how cooperation between the technical skills training and experiential learning offered by a polytechnical institute, and the research-based atmosphere of a university, can present students with “the best of both worlds,” says McLeod.

BCIT works very closely with the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at UBC – including department head Michael Murphy and associate professor of teaching David Oliver, to make sure that the transition from UBC to BCIT, and then back to UBC, is as seamless as possible for students, and the courses they take are coordinated in a way that accentuates their learning.

Doing so is challenging but also extremely rewarding in many ways, including seeing students enjoy very successful careers after obtaining their degree. “It’s been an amazing partnership over the years,” says McLeod.

Jared Dutra graduated from the BCIT-UBC Biotech program in 2021 and is now a research technician on the discovery team at AbCellera in Vancouver.

“Industry is a lot faster pace than I was used to,” says Dutra. “But the biotech program itself is also very fast paced because you have so many different classes, labs, and projects going on all at once. Being able to multitask and juggle totally different things is a skill that the biotech program helps with. It definitely sets you up nicely for a fast-paced industry career,” he adds.

The academic co-op experience also provided valuable experience that assisted Dutra’s post-graduation job search and the launch of his career.

“The amount of hands-on wet lab experience was a major advantage compared to other undergrad programs. I learned lab skills that I still use on a weekly basis like cell culture, flow cytometry, transfection, and ELISAs. The mandatory co-op program was super useful for getting practical skills in real-world environments,” he says.

Working in teams on a lot of small and large group projects has also proved beneficial. “AbCellera is a very collaborative company and it was helpful to have the experience of working in groups with different personalities,” says Dutra.

BCIT also has a new partnership with the Canadian Alliance for Skills and Training in Life Sciences (CASTL). The anticipated supply of biomanufacturing talent in Canada is expected to be well short of the requirement by the end of the decade, so this partnership will deliver biomanufacturing training to help fill that gap.

“This is evolving out of the push from the federal and provincial governments to develop the capability to independently manufacture vaccines and therapeutics in Canada, so that if there is another pandemic we have the ability to rapidly increase our manufacturing in that area so we’re not dependent on other countries,” McLeod explains.

BCIT recently received more than $5.2 million in federal funding, plus $2 million from the B.C. government to create a National Biomanufacturing Training Centre in connection with the partnership between BCIT and CASTL. A training facility will be located at BCIT’s Aerospace Technology campus located in Richmond.

“This facility will assist B.C. to meet its domestic needs in the short term, and international needs over the medium term. It will provide students with the ability to learn about and conduct work in accordance with Good Manufacturing Practices. Multiple streams of educational programs will be developed to provide academic, upskilling and reskilling offerings,” says Lisa Chu, Dean of the School of Health Sciences at BCIT.

McLeod stresses that BCIT’s Biotechnology Program is committed to continuing to deliver a comprehensive education for its students.

“We enjoy the small cohort nature, the fact that we have a very close relationship with our students and they have a close relationship with us. They get a lot of mentoring that helps them launch their careers. They get exposure to such a dynamic and exciting industry with so many impacts on human health, on the environment, on our planet.

“We see students get really passionate during the course of their education about biotechnology, and the promise of what biotechnology can deliver for our world,” says McLeod.