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Summer Visit - 2017 - CephC:LABS

The summer visit to Caltech is 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 CephC-LABS team came to visit in June 2017. The core team educators attended, plus 5 students.

Quotes

  • Best thing about the trip = Learning how to do astronomical analysis and participating in the process of authentic science. Nobody in the history of humanity has done exactly what we’re doing. That’s amazing.
  • [student:] In my personal opinion the best thing was being able to do actual science and not just something like I do in school.
  • [student:] The best thing about this trip was the knowledge that we are looking at data untouched by other eyes. It gave me such a rush of adrenaline, knowing that our data hasn't ever been worked with!
  • No, [this work] could not have been done online and had the same effect. Online has too many limitations. The amount of information was vast. Although, after the visit, the online will take on a new dimension. The trip activated us all in ways, (although we will be negotiating the startup of school for a few weeks), that if we can be patient, should result in higher motivation levels and a deeper sense of commitment by all involved. It was also good to learn the personalities of the students. We learned a lot in a short amount of time, and the students would never had been up to speed / gaps in knowledge, without the face-to-face time.
  • The work we conducted at Caltech could not have been accomplished online. The benefits of all working in the same room were enormous. We could get/give help, ask questions to Luisa in person, and check our answers. There is no way I could have a thorough understanding of the SEDs, aperture photometry, or the color-color and color-magnitude diagrams without hearing the description from Luisa, working on it, asking questions, collaborating, and working some more. I believe we could have benefited from having one more day (or even half day) as a work day similar to the Thursday workday.

Related Teams

Summer Visit - 2017 - CephC:LABS