• NASA
  • IPAC

Summer Visit - 2019 - IDYL

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 IDYL team came to visit in July-August 2019. The 4 core team educators attended, plus 5 students.

Quotes

  • The least surprising was that there are really smart people working at Caltech. I thought that the visit from the other IPAC staff, Luisa's thoughtful guidance during the week, as well as Varoujan's JPL tour, showed this in spades.
  • [The best thing about the trip was] Meeting everyone on the team in person and working on astrophysics at Caltech! I have been looking forward to this week ever since I was accepted in the program. I can honestly say I learned astrophysics at Caltech with an outstanding astronomy research scientist. Not very many people can say that! Our team really came together as one and that made the whole process very enjoyable in my opinion.
  • [student:] While learning so much was definitely a huge part of this trip, I would say the best thing about the trip would be the teamwork. To get all of us in the same room to work on this research and bounce ideas off of each other was truly amazing. It was great to have a team that was dedicated to the same goal and we were all passionate about what we would do with this newfound knowledge and research when it is all said and done.
  • The best thing about the trip was the ability to work with my NITARP group in person. Yes, it was a lot of work. Yes, the down time was minimal at best but we all learned from each other in a very (very) supportive, yet guided, learning environment. I know that I would not have understood the process or the product as well by working through conference calls.
  • I appreciate knowing that astronomers celebrate their “geekiness” and their families. I believe that point alone squelches many preconceived notions. Not only did it change how I understand astronomers but how others understand astronomers. The look on people’s faces when I talk about the Caltech astronomer and how *she* is guiding us through the research process, is extremely telling. I think it is easy to point the finger at others when they profile astronomers as “old white guys in lab coats” but I am afraid I may have also held that misinformed preconceived notion.

Related Teams

Summer Visit - 2019 - IDYL