>From: "Moore, Julie" <uzm5@cdc.gov> >To: Cytometry Mailing List <cytometry@flowcyt.cyto.purdue.edu> >Subject: kits versus comprehension--a comment Julie: More thoughts if I may... This very subject is almost a continuous thread on the bionet.molbio.methods-reagents usenet group. It crops up about 3 times a year and often divides the group into kit-haters, kit-lovers, and those in the middle. >Flow Folks-I apologize for clogging the list with this kind of response, but >I am a bit dismayed at this negative commentary regarding present day >graduate students... I don't suppose the "one bad apple (or a few) spoil the bunch" adage would sooth your being dismayed? I didn't think so... >Having earned my PhD not so long ago, I am not so far removed that I cannot >remember what it was like or what approaches were taken in the lab that I >feel made me more than just an automaton. It is my opinion, and I feel >quite strongly about this, that the lack of understanding on the part of >graduate students regarding what exactly is going on "in that tube" does not >and can not lie entirely on the student. Graduate training is just that: >TRAINING. If a student does not understand, or at least fully appreciate, >what she or he is doing, that student's mentor is not free from blame. I >think in the rush to publish, publish, publish (both on the part of mentor >and student), the active exchange and intellectual discussion that should be >a part of any laboratory, especially those in which graduate students are >pursuing their degrees, falls by the wayside. Unfortunately, kits provide >an easy way to get things done quickly and efficiently-but this does not >prevent anyone from reading the classic papers (and the contemporary good >ones) and actively discussing the theory behind experiments and the >implications of the results! > >In this generation of kits, we need to ask ourselves: what has happened to >mentor responsibility? Thank you... I couldn't agree more... This is something I've been wrestling with since leaving grad school myself (over 12 years ago). I don't know if I had just become more critical or less tolerant with age, but while in grad school it seemed to me that incoming undergrads had less and less analytical skills behind them. A real "eye-opener" was seeing a few graphs in an upper division microbiology lab wherein time was plotted on the "Y" axis! Obviously, the concept of dependent and independent variables was lost somewhere. I don't want to bash grad students but it appears to me as though more and more are having trouble applying information from one course to another course or to their lab bench. They can memorize very well, but practical application and analytical skills are seemingly becoming rare. I have also observed that, happily, there are exceptions! However, the issue of "kits" and training only compounds the problem. My problem with kits are two fold. 1) as you've mentioned, unless one has a conscientious mentor that encourages active thinking, kits will more often than not produce lazy thinking in both student and mentor. With my own ears, I've heard more than one graduate student say "what kit do I need to answer this question?"... This type of thinking makes my blood sublime... This kind of approach and thinking must be blocked early on. Second, very often kits have some proprietary ingredient about which the end user will never know what comprises it. When the kit fails, one doesn't know if it is because of the quality of starting material or if magic ingredient X no longer works, or doesn't work with your bacterial or cellular system. This in turn can also breed lazy thinking. Since one doesn't know where to start problem solving, it is easier to simply move to another method "If company X's kit didn't work, maybe company Y's will!". They can also breed lazy work habits. A post-doc of a colleague of mine bellyached that he'd had a very hard day and was ready for a beer with his lunch after he only did 12 Promega wizard mini-DNA preps. I needed Rolaids after hearing this... (THE only way I can make this thread applicable to this listserv is that I will argue that CsCl prepared DNA is far better than any DNA obtained with a kit and subsequently so are the transfections and *sorting* of transfected cells!) Yes, Julie, I would strongly agree that since the student is a direct product of the mentor, the mentor shares far more of the responsibility for this sort of failed instruction. By the way, do I use kits? Yes. I've also made sure that my tech and students know how to perform other procedures that, albeit are homegrown, will also produce transfectable (sortable...) and sequencable DNA. Many kits work well and actually have nothing proprietary in them as they are only q/c'ed to death, cDNA and site-directed mutagenesis kits come readily to mind. Happy sorting... David ============================= David L. Haviland, Ph.D. Asst. Prof. Immunology University of Texas - Houston, H.S.C. Institute of Molecular Medicine 2121 W. Holcombe Blvd. Houston, TX 77030 Internet:"dhavilan@imm2.imm.uth.tmc.edu" Voice: 713.500.2413 FAX: 713.500.2424 ------------------------------------------------------ I try to take one day at a time but lately several days have attacked me at once! =============================
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Wed Apr 03 2002 - 11:53:18 EST