Bioanalytical Chemistry is a funny module. Not funny in the amusing sense, but in the weird kind of way.
First of all, the lecturer (we heard) was only informed he's taking this module three weeks before the start of the semester. Then, over a hundred students registered for this module (a normal class size for a graduate module is lesser then forty; I was surprise went I walked in late to a packed lecture theatre). These led to the lecturer being rather overwhelmed. At least for the first lecture, he had no idea how he's going to conduct his assessment.
The lecturer is apparently an anti-exam/quiz/test type, preferring to have presentation, essay and project as the mode of assessment. However, with 100+ student, there's no way he can conduct presentation sessions for everyone in the way he wants (3-4 per group, and not too early into the semester so as to be fair). Then there's the issue of assessing class participation for such a big group.
Thus, for the first lecture, a good part was spent on discussing how to resolve the issue, with the lecturer rambling on and on most of the time, about what he wanted to do and why so, when it is obvious it can't be done with such a big class size. Even when offered suggestions (e.g. have quiz and exam instead), the lecturer insisted on what he wanted to do, and gave lengthy explanations.
Now, three weeks into the semester, with the class size reduced to a comfortable level, the lecturer is rolling out his plan for assessment (one presentation, one essay, small quizzes), though it's still feel pretty much like a plan-as-we-go thing, as the lecturer repeatedly state he will see how the class participation component -i.e. small quizzes - goes. (Yes, the lecturer is a long-winded type).
With the situation above, I think I can be forgiven for feeling a bit confused about this lecture. However, that doesn't really matter because of the good bits: I'm being grouped with people I know for my presentation, and the subject (which is also the essay title) was already selected. On top of that, the lecturer did away with the exam (which was originally planned), making this a non-examinable module, and the essay has a generous dateline of the supposed exam date. What this all means is that, I do not need to study anything from the lectures, I just need to remember them long enough to do the occasional quizzes at the end of the lectures.
Furthermore, I can spend more time on the two other modules, and also on writing my thesis, which I should really get started and stop all procrastination already.
Labels: MSc
