Genre
Laboratory Drama
Runtime
6 Months
Cast
Amelie: An honours student who will stay in the lab for 10 months.
Louis: A 3rd year postgraduate and Amelie’s mentor.
Zack: A 3rd year postgraduate. Together with Louis, they are in charge of the purchasing and maintaining lab supplies.
Janice: A foreign postgraduate who comes to the lab for an 5-month exchange programme.
Dr Boss: The principal investigator of the lab.
Synopsis
Set in a professor’s laboratory in a university, the story is about one postgraduate who keeps common lab items to himself and how this act affects the progress of other lab members.
After 4 months of working in the lab, Amelie notices that Louis keeps many common-use reagents and lab consumables to himself and does not share them with anyone else even when the supplies are low. He even labels several machines with his name and disallows others to use them. Consequently, Zack and Janice’s experiment progress are suspended for 3 months, and they become unhappy with the situation.
When Amelie tries talking to him, he angrily claims that it is other lab members’ fault for not maintaining the lab supplies. Amelie is also afraid that if she tells Dr Boss directly about the problem, Louis may treat her bad revengefully in the remaining months.
How should Amelie deal with the situation to make things better for everyone?
Review
In this story, the main possible cause may be that Louis is so concerned of his own experiment progress that he ignores the needs of other lab members. He may also be excessively worried about not having enough lab supplies for his experiment. On the other hand, neither Louis nor Zack makes frequent purchases for their experiments and therefore, lab supplies often run low.
Drama Rating
3/5 stars
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6 comments:
Hi seaming, I have a friend who went through this rather similar problem like your friend did. She did her final year project last semester and she had a mentor who was very mean too.
From what I heard, her mentor even made her carry his lab coat around for him. He hindered the progress of other final year students as he constantly controls the usage of the lab equipments. However, my friend just bear with it throughout her whole final year project. Likewise, she felt afraid that if she would have told her boss about it, her mentor would treat her badly in revenge and that is why she did not dare to voice out.
However, for the case of Amelie, I would suggest that she talk to Zack and Janice too. Perhaps they could voice out the problems to Dr Boss instead of Amelie herself. I feel that Zack and Janice are of higher seniority since they are post graduates, having them voicing out these comments would be more appropriate. =)
I like the fun manner you present your "drama". :)
Keeping track of lab supplies and replenishing stock--isn't that the job of a lab officer? If lab supplies is the problem, then why not suggest to Dr Boss to hire a lab officer to deal with these "minor" issues?
Or at least get Dr Boss to clearly assign one of the post-graduates this task (hopefully not Louis) and do clear record keeping and tracking? Then Louis cannot continue his "control-freak" actions. At the same time, Dr Boss can ensure fair "housekeeping chores" work distribution among the lab members and peace in the "household".
If Amelie does not with to get Dr Boss involved, then how about getting Zack to be more pro-active in maintaining lab supplies? Janice should not do this as she is on exchange but if she volunteers, then work out an agreement among the lab members. Fixed or rotation of duties may be acceptable to all. Paste the worked-out arrangement prominently to remind everyone of their roles. It is not Amelie's job to maintain lab supplies.
This problem arises partly due to communication problems and selfishness.
Hi Sea Ming
You've penned your thoughts down in a very interesting and smart way!
I feel that all other persons affected, not just Amelie, should come together and talk about it with Louis and work something out. Should he still be adamant about it, the trio should then approach Dr. Boss.
Just a question, won't it reflect badly on Louis too if Amelie cannot progress or do a good job at her project since he is her mentor? Shouldn't that make him less adamant and receptive to working out a solution with all the persons involved, especially Amelie?
Sincerely
Yilin
Hey Seaming,
I like the way you present your "drama" like posting this time round. It is very creative and "fresh" to me.
In my opinion, I would suggest Amelie to discuss this matter thoroughly with Zack and Janice since both of them have also been affected by Louis's action. If the need arises, Zack or Janice will be the more suitable candiditate to raise the issue to Dr. Boss in order to protect herself from any mistreatment by her mentor, Louis.
Furthermore, Zack should be more pro-active in handling the purchase of lab supplies since the lab consumables are running low. Unless, Dr. Boss's grant is running low and there is a need to wait for the new grant to be approve before any comsumables purchase can be done.
Sincerely,
Danny.
Great job, Seaming. Thanks for the creativity.
Thanks everyone for your comments! Sorry I am replying to this so late.
To update all of you on this, Zack had initiated a small meeting between him and Amelie and Janice to discuss about this matter. They have told Dr Boss about this situation. Dr Boss held a meeting with everybody, including Louis and set new rules so that Louis has no power to 'hide' anythings in the future.
Alvin: Thanks for your sharing. It seems that politics are everywhere. You got the point that seniority does help in voicing out opinions.
Sharon: The lab supplies for that particular lab is not the lab officer's jobscope, it is Louis and Zack. In the latest meeting, the roster for replenishing lab supplies between Louis and Zack were reported to all members.
Yilin: It is weird that Louis didn't even care whether he is affected badly by the performance of his honours student. It seems like he is just concerned of his own project.
Danny: Yes, Zack should be more pro-active. Currently all the other lab members are constantly reminding him to keep his work on time.
Thanks everybody and Brad for your comments! You all have given just the accurate solutions. You might have guessed it, I am the Amelie! =)
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