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Summer Visit - 2013 - CM4Sy

The summer visit to Caltech is 3-4 days long and is the only time during the year of work when all the participants on the team come together in person to work intensively on the data. Generally, each educator may bring up to two students to the summer visit that are paid for by NITARP, and they may raise funds to bring two more. The teams work at Caltech; the summer visit typically includes a half-day tour of JPL, which is a favorite site for group photos. Reload to see a different set of quotes.

The CM4Sy team came to visit in July 2013. The core team educators attended, plus 11 students.

Quotes

  • [Before this,] I had two visions of astronomy: telescopes and massive equations/data tables. This trip really emphasized that its not just telescopes and equations, but tangible data and analytical skills. It was really rewarding for my high school students and I to analyze this real data. It was also very interesting to learn that the data is public and anyone can use the data to learn science.
  • [student:] I have found that astronomy is much more than peering through telescopes. Astronomers analyze data collected from various instruments and observatories to either prove a theory or to make new ways to explain the universe.
  • I knew that astronomers conducted most of their research with computers accessing data from distant telescopes and spacecraft, but I didn’t realize how much of it is available to the general public and how readily available it is to amateur astronomers and other interested folks.
  • It was most rewarding to watch my students gain confidence in science and to shed some self-doubt. I think I shed a good deal of self-doubt as well.
  • I discovered that astronomers are just regular people that don’t know everything. They make mistakes just like the rest of us. They are just passionate about what they do and are rewarded for that passion with admiration (but not necessarily money) from the general public. They have cool jobs in awesome places, but most do not get rich from their pursuit of knowledge. Access to data and astronomical images is easy. It is coming up with great questions that makes an astronomer great.

Related Teams

Summer Visit - 2013 - CM4Sy