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Summer Visit - 2013 - C-CWEL

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 "C-CWEL" team came to visit in August 2013. The core team educators attended, plus 11 students.

Quotes

  • [Three best things about this trip:] Learning a new skill and the great gains in understanding and knowledge about the subject. Watching the students from a wide variety of locations and background come together and form friendships, working relationships, and build support for the project and each other. Getting the opportunity to work on a project such as this with other educators from various disciplines and backgrounds come together to form friendships, working relationships, and build support for the project and each other.
  • [student:] I was surprised by the wonderful people on the team who had flown in from different places around the country. I did not anticipate being part of such a large group but it as a pleasant surprise.
  • [student: The most surprising thing] is that I am learning to use these complex tools and programs.
  • I was pleasantly surprised at the mature behavior and intellectual level of the student participants. They have taken the work seriously, enjoyed the out of work time activities and gained an incredible new network of resources for their future career endeavors. The students make excellent partners for learning and are highly able to acquire new skills. When partnered with more careful and experienced researchers, they can move through large data sets with ease, and accuracy. They are more easily frustrated by errors and do not have training in trouble shooting and meta-cognition that can let them solve more problems alone.
  • For students, I think they need to understand that the project is ultimately ad investigation into something brand new – there is not right or wrong, clear end point, or place to check your work. They also need to remember that this is real research – not a basic lab or pull out session – there is real work that lasts longer than 55 min at a stretch and takes dedicated brain effort. Also not to be upset if wrong from time to time – it is all part of the process and a great learning opportunity.

Related Teams

Summer Visit - 2013 - C-CWEL