AAS - 2017

The Winter American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting is the largest meeting of professional astronomers in the world. NITARP educators attend an AAS first to meet their team, then they go home and work remotely for much of the year, and then attend an AAS to present their results. At any given AAS, then, we could have two NITARP classes attending - those finishing up, and those getting started. Reload to see a different set of quotes.

The 2016 and 2017 NITARP teams attended the 2017 January AAS meeting in Dallas, TX. The 2016 class was presenting results and the 2017 class was starting up. We had many alumni raise money to come back as well. We sent about 50 people to the AAS and had a grand time. Please see the special article on NITARP at the AAS. All of the posters we presented are here:

2016 teams:
- Science Poster - Orr et al., "Finding High Quality Young Star Candidates in Ceph C Using X-ray, Optical, and IR Data"
- Education Poster - Orr et al., "STEM Education is Missing This ..."
- Science Poster - Kilts et al., "Searching for Short-Term Variable Active Galactic Nuclei: A Vital Step Towards Using AGN as Standard Candles"
- Education Poster - Kohrs et al., "NITARP: Changing Perceptions of Science Among Secondary Students and Teachers"
Returning Alumni teams:
- Education Poster - Bensel & Cool, "Are We Alone? GAVRT Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI) Project"
- Education Poster - Tran et al., "Analysis of Visual Double Stars"
- Science Poster - Johnson et al., "An Infrared Search for Young Stellar Objects in IC 1396"
- Science Poster - Wilson et al., "Searching for Infrared Excesses around White Dwarf Stars"
- Education Poster - Linder et al., "Confirming and Improving Ross Variable Star RV Del"
- Science Poster - Linder et al., "Rotational Study of Ambiguous Taxonomic Classified Asteroids"
NITARP Management:
- Evaluations And Impact (presented as education poster): Rebull et al., "The NASA/IPAC Teacher Archive Research Program (NITARP): Lessons Learned"

Quotes

[student:] Without NITARP I wouldn't have been able to learn to push myself when work becomes frustrating and it gave me a bigger aspiration to become an astronomer.
I cannot imagine a better opportunity for students to use actual data and work with a professional astronomer. Regardless of what kind of science a student wishes to pursue in the future, working with REAL scientists and REAL data will give them experiences that will prepare them for college and beyond.
I really feel that NITARP is a model that needs to be replicated in some fashion for teachers (in any field, really) everywhere. How can teachers effectively teach STEM, particularly, in this new environment without really having done research themselves? Most STEM programs are good at introducing teachers to engineering. What we need now are programs, like NITARP, that get teachers involved in real science.
[student:] I plan to attend college and major in astrophysics. I hope to someday work for NASA or a private research facility. This experience gave me the confidence I needed to solidify these career goals, transforming my fear into impatience.
[student:] If I had to tell Congress what people who experience this learn is to express their love for information and learning. There is a constant need of learning to understand the many mysteries to us. You develop this new feeling of always wanting to continue your understanding. You might understand the basics of something, but there is something more. No matter what field you are going into, you are able to take back a lot from this. Whether you want to go into math, physics, astronomy or even art, there is something in this program that will help you with that.

AAS - 2017

Quotes

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