Do you get to work with a partner in a chem lab? Are chem labs ususally crowded?

[alexfoleyc]

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There are 54 students in my chem lab which I'll be starting this fall. I concerned about safety. How can 54 students work in a lab? There are 2 instructors btw. There were 18 students on one of my bio labs. But why so many in chem labs?

 

[TooMuchResearch]

Is this a gen chem lab? It's pretty hard to seriously hurt yourself in a gen chem lab, so safety shouldn't be that much of an issue.

 

[alexfoleyc]

Is this a gen chem lab? It's pretty hard to seriously hurt yourself in a gen chem lab, so safety shouldn't be that much of an issue.

Yea, its gen chem. But are there labs generally large?

 

[TooMuchResearch]

Yea, its gen chem. But are there labs generally large?

Depends on the school.

 

[Wheee]

My school sets it up in that you sign up for one big lab (maybe 40 kids at a time) and then at the first session they split into two lab rooms. Every chem class I've taken has had lab partners, except quantitative (which my class was only like 15 people anyway).

I want to say there's laws about how big a lab class can be, but maybe that was either my university or people talking about what they should do...

 

[URHere]

My school sets it up in that you sign up for one big lab (maybe 40 kids at a time) and then at the first session they split into two lab rooms. Every chem class I've taken has had lab partners, except quantitative (which my class was only like 15 people anyway).

I want to say there's laws about how big a lab class can be, but maybe that was either my university or people talking about what they should do...

My undergrad did something kind of similar. During registration you signed up for a lab section, but during the first week or two of class, the professors would explain that online registration was just for technical purposes and that all students needed to sign up on paper for their actual lab sections. There were 4 different lab sections per day, 3-4 days per week. In each lab, there were no more than 15 students.

I'm not sure what your school does, but I'm sure they'll explain it to you before your labs actually start.

 

[TooMuchResearch]

My school sets it up in that you sign up for one big lab (maybe 40 kids at a time) and then at the first session they split into two lab rooms. Every chem class I've taken has had lab partners, except quantitative (which my class was only like 15 people anyway).

I want to say there's laws about how big a lab class can be, but maybe that was either my university or people talking about what they should do...

I really doubt there are laws on this issue. If there are, the government is just way, way too big. My labs were typically between 5-20 students. I think 10-12 worked best in our labs because it was enough people that someone at every always knew what they were doing but not so many that it was crowded.

 

[dancingdoc1]

My gen chem lab had 48 students - it was in a really big room. In a class that size you'll probably have at least 3 TAs so you'll have plenty of help if you need it. And I wouldn't worry about safety - gen chem lab is pretty tame. You have to go a bit farther in chemistry to get to the fun stuff 🙂

 

[runrunrudolph1]

haha I think you are thinking way too much into this. In order for a class to be in session it must go through a series of requirements, and being a science LAB safety is pretty high on the list of requirements. It's ok to have a lab this big, especially if you are attending a large school...

Plus none of the experiments you do in general chem. are even remotely dangerous... so again, I think it will be ok