[Nfb-science] labs

[kwcurrin]

To the List Serve,

Hello. My name is Kevin Currin. I am a freshman biochemistry major at the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This semester I took my first
lab course (general chemistry 1) along with the lecture with general
chemistry 2 (I had to postpone the lab from last semester to get some
accessibility issues straightened out). I had a lot of issues with
accessibility however. The school provided me with a lab assistant and I
used the logger pro software (3.8.2) for data collection. Logger pro didn't
seem that compatible with my version of jaws. I downloaded some scripts,
but the only ones available were for an older version of logger pro. Some
of the submenus weren't read aloud. While a sensor was collecting, there
was no data read aloud to track what was going on. There also wasn't much
reading of graphs.

When I was working in the lab, I didn't have any accessible equipment to
transfer chemicals or weigh samples. My lab assistant ended up doing most
of that or would tell me when I had filled a container to a certain point.
The supervisor of the general chem lab department said she purchased some
syringes of different volumes (1 mL, 5 mL, 10 mL and so on) that could be
previously filled that would help me transfer chemicals accurately without
assistance. However, she never labeled them nor gave them to me. 

I encountered other problems, but I think what I've written so far gives a
good overview. Does anyone have any suggestions for what I should do to
make my future lab experiences more beneficial? I really would like to
start doing undergraduate research within the next year, but at this point,
I don't see how my current lab skills would make that possible. 

Thanks,

Kevin