Overview


Hands-On Labs, Inc. (HOL) is a science education company devoted to the development, design, production, and marketing of academically aligned science laboratory kits for secondary and post secondary students and institutions worldwide. 

This educator-owned company pioneered the field of single student/single use, academically aligned science lab kits in 1994. They were the first to facilitate teaching science courses with a hands-on lab component completely at a distance. Today HOL is the world’s leader in its field and produces a wide array of LabPaqs in biological and health sciences, chemistry, earth sciences, forensic science, and physics. 

What Are LabPaqs?

LabPaq® is the registered brand name for HOL’s unique products.  They are not simply science kits.  Rather, LabPaqs are best thought of as a “complete laboratory in a box.”  They …

  • Are academically aligned, course specific, boxed collections of science equipment and supplies that provide rigorous laboratory experiences
  • Provide traditional “wet labs” remote of a formal laboratory facility
  • Meet standard curricula and learning objectives
  • Are specifically designed by leading science educators
  • Mirror the experiments performed on campus labs around the world
  • Are complete with a full color lab manual on CD and contain all required science equipment, chemicals, specimens, and supplies
  • Employ “green” micro-scale science principles and techniques
  • Permit accredited, transferrable science lab work virtually anytime, anywhere
  • Are SAFE, fully insured, and have a 15-year, 100% safety record!
  • Are used by tens of thousands of college and high school students each year

How LabPaqs Support Science Education

Lab science courses were not initially or extensively offered in the early days of online education.  Instructors were resistant over quandaries about how to provide effective lab experiences to off-campus students.  LabPaqs have since become increasingly used, and their proven effectiveness has been instrumental in breaking down resistance and increasing institutions’ willingness to offer lab sciences online. 

Computer simulations, kitchen chemistry, hybrid courses, and other lab substitutes continue to be used, but with limited success and questionable instructional value.  Most state education boards today insist that hands-on labs be a major component of accredited science courses.  These issues paved the way for LabPaqs to demonstrate their value and to prove that students can engage in valid science experimentation outside of a formal campus laboratory.

The demand for higher education continues to rise, and online course enrollments are expected to escalate even further over the next decade.  A weak economy and rising unemployment also increases enrollments as displaced workers seek retraining, often in science fields such as nursing, medical technology, and renewable energy.  Adult students with family and work obligations are strapped for time and resources.  LabPaqs allow them to perform lab science experiments from the convenience of their homes and within their personal schedules.  They can spend as much time as needed to fully understand the science concepts they must learn.

Campus-based, face-to-face science courses increasingly utilize LabPaqs.  LabPaqs meet the needs of on-campus students too, plus they help alleviate on-campus lab bottlenecks and free formal lab facilities for graduate courses and research.  Instructors are free to spend more time teaching and interacting with their students when they aren’t saddled with having to stock, organize, maintain, and supervise campus labs. 

Students genuinely enjoy and benefit from the discovery learning opportunities afforded by LabPaqs.  This success is confirmed by formal studies which reveal that students using LabPaqs have greater levels of learning satisfaction and higher grades on learning assessments than their campus based peers. 

LabPaqs are “adopted” in a manner similar to the adoption of course textbooks.  Students are instructed to obtain the appropriate LabPaq for the fulfillment of their science lab requirements.  Students place orders securely online and their LabPaqs are shipped from HOL’s warehouse within one business day.  College Financial Aid Departments also place orders online, and these LabPaqs are direct shipped to the students and billed to the Department.

Today, institutions worldwide adopt LabPaqs for both their distance education and on-campus lab science courses because LabPaqs create win/win/win situations:

  • Students win with convenient yet effective laboratory experiences!
  • Instructors win with more quality teaching time and energy!
  • Institutions win with happy students, happy faculty, and greater enrollments!