Animal dissection has been a traditional teaching tool in biology for centuries. However, harmful animal use in education has raised ethical and environmental concerns in the last decades and led to an ongoing debate about the role and importance of animal dissection in teaching across all education levels. To understand the current status of dissection in secondary education and the attitudes towards humane teaching alternatives among the educators, I conducted a survey – for the first time – among high school biology teachers in Switzerland. The specific aims of this study were i) to explore the extent of animal or animal parts dissection in high school biology classes, ii) to understand the attitudes and experiences of high school biology teachers towards dissection and animal-free alternatives, and iii) to gain some insight into the circumstances hindering a wider uptake of alternatives to animal dissection in high school education. In total, 76 teachers participated in the onl