Outcomes of an intensive summer course in reproductive biology

The Frontiers in Reproduction (FIR) course has been held annually, starting in 1998, at the Marine Biological Laboratories in Woods Hole, MA. To evaluate the impact of the FIR course in training reproductive biologists, a group of participants who completed the course between 1998 and 2002 were surveyed. The major findings of the survey were that: (1) FIR had a positive impact on the overall career development of the participants; (2) a significant majority (97%) continue to conduct research in the reproductive sciences; (3) 58% had successfully competed for grant funding; and (4) manuscripts by participants were published in higher-impact journals. In summary, FIR has had an overall positive influence worldwide on the training of future scientists whose research interests and studies are focused on the reproductive sciences.