(February 28, 2001) -- On Feb. 16, Virginia Benzer’s honors physiology class took a field trip to the Los Angeles Chiropractic Anatomy Lab at Whittier College. The trip gave students the opportunity to learn about the human body by allowing them to have a hands-on experience with human organs.

Having taken her previous science classes on the same trip, Benzer said that it would be another good experience to also take her honors physiology class this year so that they could have the real life experience of watching an autopsy. “I have found in taking other students to this field trip that it is extremely enlightening to observe real cadavers,” Benzer said.

At the lab, students were assigned to medical students who led the group of students through the identification of different body organs and systems. Students were able to touch and examine a cadaver, human and animal bones, a brain, ears, and eyeball and developing fetuses.

Some students said they felt that the trip was a great learning experience outside their everyday class structured education. Junior Jane Park said, “It was a good experience because instead of just learning the information from our books, we actually go to see them in real life.”

According to Benzer, the purpose of the field trip was to give students a real taste of what physiologists experience. “It would greatly aid those students who are planning to major in the human body sciences when it comes to watching real dissections and autopsies,” said Benzer.