Complain.....

I could not stand with my Teaching Assistant for one of the subjects. So I filed a complain. This was my email for professor.

Dear Sir,
I am in the Roopsha's Group for the lab session. There were a lot of confusion in today lab session.
a) When we obtained negative absorption values, she insisted that we had mistakes. However, we were told later that it was quite common to obtain negative values as it might be the void volume by the Assoc Prof.
b) We were told to obtain 5 consecutive elutions that had the highest adsorption. We were informed later that we just need to pick those that had the highest adsorption and it may not necessary to be consecutive.
c) She was unclear about the setting up of Gel Filtration Chromatography and the Assoc Prof helped us out of this situations.
d) She could not perform the calculations for the first practical and again we consult the Assoc Prof.
e) She told us to measure the exact time for 3ml of elution to elute out. However, we were told later that we just need a rough estimations.

I understand that she might be the first times coaching us the lab session. However, I hope that she can confirm the lab techniques with others prior to the lab session as we end up more confuse than before the practical. The lab session is important to us as we need to apply the lab techniques during our open lab session. I did not hope that the situation persist and continue to worsen.
Thanks.

Yours sincerely,
(matric number)

My professor replied me immediately in the next morning.

Dear XX,

I can understand your concern. Please be bear in mind that there could be small differences in one's view towards a particular experiment. There are no absolute true or false methods, it depends on the situations. The points that you raised are minor issues and we will try to urge the TA to improve her performance. Please also bear for your T.A. as she is a graduate student and just started coaching in the lab, it is an opportunity for her to learn as well and part of her training. At the same time, try also use your own knowledge and an open mind to determine whether a particular advice is sound or not. In any doubt, please come to me as I will always be around in the lab during the practical session.

XX

He was very kind. I did not hope that anything bad occur to my TA, However, after the first two practical session, I just felt too disappointed. She created unnecessary fear and confusions in us. Haixxx....I am not going to say anything bad about her here again. I had chat with my roommate about this matter and I had enough complain already. My roomate told me to tell others in the same group with me to file complain together so that our opinion will be heard. Erm....I did not hope to gave her a difficult time.
She is an Indian. I had to admit that I do has some stereotype impression on Indians. For instance, being lazy and irresponsible. Some students from India get the scholarship or whatever loans and went back their country upon graduation. They had a ban into Singapore later. But my professor for this semester is an Indian too. Apart from being a bit boring during lecture class, I think that he is good and he know his stuffs. I suppose it is not all the Indians that are not good after all.
My friends are quite supportive to me as she cannot stand with the TA too and we still had a open lab session that still need the guide from TA. (I really do not hope that she is still the one teaching us.) The project cost us 50 marks.
It gave me a weird feeling after I file this complain. I do not wish to become a fussy person that always complain but I did feel that someone need to do something for this matter.