Inside Kinesiology's School of Anatomy

Did you know? In our Kinesiology program, you get to study anatomy on real human cadavers — in your first year!

Waterloo is among just a handful of universities in Canada that gives first-year students this kind of hands-on experience.

Tamara Maciel is the Program Director for the School of Anatomy and she takes pride in teaching in the human anatomy lab for KIN 100 (required course that all first-year Kin students take) and helping her students build the skills they need if they want to pursue a career in health or medicine.

Tamara thinks learning anatomy is a lot like learning a new language: it requires practice and repetition. But Tamara tries to make learning anatomy as practical and hands-on as possible by focusing on concepts, logical relationships, and experiential learning.

While anatomy apps for mobile devices can supplement this experiential learning, Tamara admits she is a bit old school, she says “there are no substitutes for the real thing.”

Get an inside look at Waterloo’s School of Anatomy and meet Tamara by watching this video.

NOTE: This video features our old anatomy lab space. It's been updated and is even brighter and better now! We just haven't had a chance to film in it yet. But the content you'll learn is the same, so this video is still worth checking out.