2014 Pre-Symposium Workshops

ChABSA is pleased to offer this year's pre-symposium workshops.

1.) 4-hour (Dr. Kathryn Harris), June 24th 8:00AM -12:00PM Institutional Biosafety Committee (IBC) Basics: An Introduction to the NIH Guidelines and the Oversight of Recombinant and Synthetic Nucleic Acid Research IBC Basics is a half-day workshop on the history, function, and administration of Institutional Biosafety Committees (IBCs). Delivered by expert staff from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Office of Biotechnology Activities (OBA), IBC Basics will promote the professional development of those associated with IBCs, by providing an opportunity to: Learn about the NIH OBA, the content of the NIH Guidelines for Research Involving Recombinant and Synthetic Nucleic Acid Molecules, and understand the range of responsibilities that IBCs have under the NIH Guidelines.

2.) 4-hour (Dr. Bob Hawley and Joe Kozlovac), June 24th 1:00PM -5:00PM Basics Elements of a Biosafety Management Program As result of completing this course, the participant will be able to initiate and manage a biological safety program. Topics discussed will include biosafety program vision, mission, goals, policies, risk assessment and management, training and education activities, as well as proposed structure and functions of a biosafety committee and mechanisms to review and evaluate program effectiveness. Group exercises will allow participants to practice the principles and recommendations discussed during the lectures.

3.) 8-hour (Dr. Matthew Cronin), June 24th 8:00PM-5:00PM Achieving Buy-in for Safety Initiatives Through Collaborative Negotiation Participants will learn how to apply collaborative negotiation techniques so that compliance with safety initiatives is less of an adversarial process, and those affected by the regulation may even be co-opted as advocates and advisees for the regulations.

4.) 8-hour (Dr. Ben Perman, James Dornak, Dr. Lindsay Odell) Implementing Personnel Security in Laboratory Biosecurity Programs Personnel security is comprised of security measures focused on people and behaviors rather than typical physical barriers approaches. Personnel security can be thought as the "administrative controls" in any advanced security program. This course will teach administration, management, and researchers the basic principles of threat assessment and introduce students to the role of comprehensive personnel security in a laboratory biosecurity programs. The course is intended to give students a basic tool-kit that will allow them to implement successful comprehensive insider threat mitigation strategies using personnel security approaches at their home institutes and to convey concepts in personnel security to their colleagues. Students will be presented with relevant case studies in order to learn about relevant threats in the biomedical and health sectors. Through an analysis of case studies, students will learn how to identify threats, link threats to vulnerabilities and, most importantly, address specific personnel security vulnerabilities. Students will learn about all aspects of personnel security including: suitability, reliability, training, peer and self reporting strategies, threat assessment, OPSEC, INFOSEC, and an introduction to elicitation, manipulation and surveillance awareness. Regulatory issues relevant to implementation of personnel security management programs, in particular changes to the Select Agent Regulations pertaining to Tier 1 agents, will also be discussed. Theoretical concepts will be put into practice in conceptual personal security program developed through direct student input using a realistic laboratory security problem that draws on the material presented in the lecture and case studies.