BY ERICA GUSTAFSON, OPINON EDITOR
In total honesty, my science distribution requirement was the top course that I dreaded all four years of my college undergraduate program. It’s not that I don’t enjoy learning new things, but I am just not a science person. I do not understand science as well as other courses, and I just don’t find it that interesting. I am a strategic communications major after all.
That being said, I made it to my final semester at St. Bonaventure University, and I still needed to complete the requirement. With all of the dread in me, I signed up for the Fundamentals of Biology and accompanying lab.
Though it has not been my worst class here at Bonaventure, I can’t help but question. I wonder why I am required to do all of the laboratory requirements alongside biology and science majors when it is just an elective.
According to my BIOL-101 syllabus, “BIOL-101 Laboratory is worth 0 credits, but amount to 23% of your final BIO-101 (4 credits) grade. BIOL-101 is a required component of BIO-101 and must be taken in the same semester. Content of the lecture and lab overlaps in that the major themes of the lecture are considered in the laboratory as well.”
I understand that labs give students hands-on work with different topics and materials to better understand them. However, I just don’t see how that is relevant to me.
I spend over three hours every Monday night sitting in a room with three other students at my \ table working on countless experiments. These laboratory assignments are supposed to support the themes we are going over in class, but we usually don’t cover most of the material before we get to the lab. That leaves us as four clueless students asking countless questions because we don’t understand what we are looking for or what is supposed to happen.
With all of the confusion, I am not a biology student in the first place. Though I enjoy learning new things within the science field, lab assignments primarily reflect what is happening in class, so I am not learning anything new material whatsoever.
If that didn’t grab my attention in the first place, there is also a fee that we are required to pay regarding the lab course. A $20 BIOL-101 fee is automatically added to our student account when starting the semester. We don’t have a choice either. Some may question why our thousands of dollars in tuition does not cover this fee, and we are required to pay again for a course the university requires you to take when signing up for the course.
I understand why there are labs in the first place, but I don’t think they are used effectively. Instead of forcing all students to undergo labs when signing up for a course, maybe laboratory courses need evaluation. One solution could be requiring biology or other science majors to undergo the labs as they pertain to future career paths of the individuals. Other students who are taking the course as an elective or distribution requirement should get a choice whether or not they want to take the lab.
In all honesty, I don’t think I am going to remember much for the laboratory course in the first place. At times, I think it is a huge waste of time for myself and others around me who are only there because they are being forced.
