I started summer school this past week, and even though it is only one class, it seems like the most overwhelming class ever. It's my general chemistry 2 lab, and it's 3 days a week, 3 hours a day. I'll start off by saying that my general chem 1 lab was the easiest class ever. My TA let us turn in our labs the next day (by 5pm), if we couldn't get it turned in, he would let us turn it in the following class (which was a week later). We were even allowed to finish the lab and leave two hours early without even LOOKING at our post-lab. He went over the whole experiment with us beforehand, and even gave us his own data. He went over the pre-lab and the post-lab with us before we even started the lab. It was so easy. To study for our final, he gave us a copy of the previous semester's exam and held a study session where he went over all the answers. He also made copies of all the pre-labs and post-labs and handed them out to everybody. Even to the students who came to his study session instead of their own TA's.
So now I'm in this chem 2 lab, and my TA much more strict, and it's very hard to make the transition. Every day before we start lab we have a quiz over the material we are covering that day. In addition to these daily quizzes, we have 4 more quizzes throughout the four week span of the class that are going to be pop quizzes over concepts that the class is having problems with. We have to hand in our pre-labs at the beginning of class, and if we don't, we can't do the lab that day. He doesn't give us answers for ANYTHING. He tries to give us hints if we ask him personally, but they don't help a bit. We have to stay the full three hours to finish our data sheets/post-lab questions, and if we don't finish them, he has to sign every paper that we're taking with us, and they're due the next day at 11am. This poses a problem for me, because I work every day, either from 8-12 or 8-5. I work an hour and fifteen minutes away, there's no way I can get the lab in by 11. I talked to him about it, and he would not make any exceptions. I can't drop it off early in the morning before I go to work because the chemistry building isn't open at 6:30am. Luckily, Kory is the best boyfriend in the world and he is willing to ride his bike up to the school for me and drop my labs off.
Not only are my TA's policies hard to deal with, but the pre-lab and post-lab questions are insanely hard!! I don't understand it. I took the lecture for this class this past spring, and I got an A, no problem. I just really don't understand the questions. My TA tried explaining the first post-lab question from yesterday's lab to me, and it seriously took 20 minutes, and I still don't fully understand it. How in the world are we supposed to find these answers if they're not in the lab manual, not in our book, and he hasn't lectured over it? My goodness, yesterday I just wanted to go sit down at a table and work on my post-lab, but noooo, no one is allowed outside of the lab room because we could possibly try to help each other with the questions. SCIENTISTS DO NOT WORK ALONE. I think it's ridiculous that we can't help each other. If someone is dumb enough to just copy someone's answers and not actually learn the material, it's going to screw them over when they take the 500 dumb quizzes, so what's the big deal? I couldn't believe that I was not allowed to go sit outside on the floor in the hallway to work on my questions. I was so mad. "Can I at least take my goggles off???" Luckily I was allowed to do that. Boy, I sure can't wait until I have to take organic chem lab. It is probably going to be a million times worse.
A few more things that bother me about this class. Everyone in the class has their own lab bench, and under each lab bench are probably 20 drawers, each full of the equipment needed for the lab. Out of the 20 drawers under my bench, the creepy lab assistant, with an angel with devil horns painted on his lab coat, gave me the key to the only drawer there that is a PIECE OF JUNK. He could have picked any of the drawers, but NO, he picks the one that doesn't work. It takes me like ten minutes to unlock my drawer everyday. I mean, you can stand back and look at all the locks and say, "Hey, number 170 needs a new lock, it looks like a piece of JUNK!" Hey! I just remembered that when he was assigning a key to me, he looked at the key, tried it in the lock, looked at the lock, looked at the key, and repeated that ten times, and then gave me the key. HE KNEW something was fishy with the lock, but he didn't care! Oh my goodness, and I have to complain about the bunsen burners. I cannot STAND them. I am scared to death of them. My whole hand was engulfed in flames yesterday, I have no idea why I didn't get burned. I either A) can't the dumb thing lit at all, or B) it ignites and the flame is like 20 feet tall and everyone around me is looking at me like i'm insane. My TA, who is actually a nice guy aside from his class policies, had to come fix/light it for me FOUR times yesterday. The guy who is at the bench next to me lit it TWICE for me. I lit it ONCE myself, it was incredibly scary. Yes, I had to light my bunsen burner seven times for yesterday's lab. Ridiculous.
