Rebecca Laposa, PhD

Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology

Dr. Rebecca Laposa is a strong proponent of empowering learners in the biomedical innovation space, with a focus on drug development. Her popular 500-student first-year breadth course,"The Art of Drug Discovery" trains tomorrow's citizen scientists. In the 4th year course,"Pharmacology and Toxicology in Drug Development, she co-teaches with pharmaceutical industry professionals to provide in-depth authentic instruction and deliverables. Dr. Laposa is the coordinator for the Department's senior undergraduate research project courses, and has revised this course to include an end-of-term poster day as well reflective writing assignments so that students can look inwards to examine the process of becoming a scientist. In her laboratory, Dr. Laposa has active Pharmacology research projects and has mentored numerous undergraduate students over a 21decade,through national studentships from NSERC and the Stem Cell Network of Canada. She is the Department's Lead for Industry Partnerships and the academic liaison for the Professional Experience Year, a year-long co-op program between years 3 and 4.

Dr. Laposa is a recent LEAF (Learning and Education Advancement Fund) awardee in a team of Faculty of Medicine teaching faculty for a large project “AdvancingBiomedical Discoveries through Experiential and Integrated Learning". The team project includes the launchof two new courses across Departments with new JBM (Joint Biomedical) course codes. Dr. Laposa will be the lead for the new "Biomedical Incubator Capstone Project", the first incubator course in the Faculty of Medicine. Here, students discover what it is like to be part of a biomedical innovation team in a simulated small business/incubator setting under the guidance of a faculty mentor.