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AAS - 2014

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 2013 and 2014 NITARP teams attended the 2014 January AAS meeting in National Harbor, MD (outside of Washington, DC). The 2013 class was presenting results and the 2014 class was starting up. We had a lot of alumni raise their own money to come back as well. We sent about 75 people to the AAS and had a grand time. Please see the special article on NITARP at the AAS. One of our participants, Peggy Piper, participated in a Congressional briefing on Thursday! All the posters we presented are linked from the team's pages below, except for HG-WELS and SIRXS, because they are the two new teams.

Quotes

  • [student:] One thing that shocked me was that not that many people asked us about the project when we were presenting. I expected everything to be more taxing and it turned out to be just exciting and fun.
  • I definitely felt more at ease at this conference than last years. [..] I was visiting with all kinds of people, retired Yale professor, grad student from Sicily, etc and not feeling out of place. It was great. I could approach others at the conference with more confidence which changes how I view professional astronomers. I think I could ask for advice on future projects more easily and confidently. I found it a very supportive environment.
  • [student:] The thing I liked most about the program was the fact that high school students were given the opportunity to participate in significant research. [..] The fact that no one knew the answer was extremely exciting. I never enjoyed the regurgitation of information that high school provides us. I understand that it is necessary to learn the basics and the only way to learn that is to solve problems that have already been solved. But this program has given me the exclusive opportunity to experience in simple terms: real life. Thank you and I hope the program continues to provide remarkable experiences.
  • [student:] The experience was one that I could not possibly ever forget.
  • [student:] The experience was great and any opportunity to do primary research is always going to be interesting and you’ll always learn something new.

Related Teams

AAS - 2014