So today I had my first lab class. They call them 'practicals' but they serve the same purpose- once a week for 2 hours, cram a bunch of kids into a room to do a lab protocol and work out some sort of analysis at the end. Today I had the practical for ENV5T5, the environmental field and techniques class. The subject today was water quality analysis. Charlene and I were barely prepared for the class, and rather nervous because back at umd and other universities in the US, science labs are very strict. You have to be there within the first 5 or 10 minutes (depending on the class) or you get kicked out, you have to have all the materials or you get kicked out, you have to be very precise about the protocol, and any questions are usually diverted, causing everyone to sort of just he said she said their way through the lab. Usually there are about 30 kids to one graduate student Teaching Assistant in 1 lab room and most people rush their way through until lab is finally over.
However, when we got there, most people were borrowing lab coats from the front of the room without any trouble, and there were 4 (!) instructors floating around. There were 40-50 kids in the room, but with 4 instructors, and so the ratio was much higher than at umd. In addition, the head instructor went through all of the procedures very clearly, and was very flexible when charlene and I told him we didn't have the worksheet to fill out. He told us to just write it in our notebooks and fill in the real one later to hand in at the end of the semester. When we split up into groups we cycled through a few procedures, all supervised by an instructor. They pretty much held our hands if we wanted them to. They also are way less precise about their measurements, and expect a lot less technical skills. Then again, they could be giving us false hope and next week we will come out sweating and dripping in chemicals.
Another interesting thing I learned about education here is that tuition is highly subsidized by the government for Scotland residents. It's as if they pay in state tuition for an already (relatively) cheap education. My friend from class pays 1,500 a year for school because she is a scottish resident. And that is common. I guess it makes sense-Scotland is not that big, neither is the UK. It was just very surprising.
So far the classes have not been too challenging, but it is very clear that everything they learn is very cumulative. At least from what I have seen of the Environmental science department, the schedule is pretty much set for you for all 4 years. You take pretty much the same classes with the same kids for all 4 years. At umd, an environmental science is interdisciplinary- we take classes from all different departments. My 4 years of classes probably is unique to me. Although their are some required classes, mostly you just pick from a list of possible classes. Since everyone is taking a different set of classes, they can't hold you accountable for as much for each class. Here, it is a pretty set schedule that accumulates over time and so the material is cumulative because everyone is on the same page.
Another difference is this group project I am part of. So far we have spent about 9 hours working on it outside of class, collecting data, meeting with our supervisor and having group meetings etc. At umd, a group research project like this could very well happen, but some class time would be allotted to complete it. However, because I spend about 3/5 the amount of time in class here than at umd, there is more work outside of class.
Thus far, I am finding my classes to be an appropriate amount of work for what I wanted. I wanted to be able to get something out of them, get credit for them, and feel like I learned something, but at the same time I wanted to have free time to devote to getting to know the country and meeting people and traveling. Thus far it has worked out pretty well. The work load really picks up in November, but until then I am feelin great.
reading writing rithmetic,
Amanda
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