• NASA
  • IPAC

Summer Visit - 2016 - LLAMMa

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 LLAMMa team came to visit in July 2016. The 3 core team educators attended, plus 11 students.


Quotes

  • [student:] Yes. I really like [astronomy]. I had an idea of what [astronomers] did but, actually doing it made me realize how much i actually liked astronomy. And as for astronomers… I realized that there is a large team of people from various backgrounds that contributed in their own ways.
  • [student:] I think patience and determination are two of the most important qualities for an astronomer to have because in astronomy there is typically a wait time for certain data to be collected and observed. It also takes a lot of determination to be able to go through so many sheets of data that may or may not be what you're looking for.
  • [student:] I think it was way better that we did everything in person because we got to meet everybody and it was much easier to ask questions and learn from the questions of others. The group changed as we got to know each other and we all became friends.
  • [student:] I think that patience and dedication are important for an astronomer because astronomy is a long process. I think that being able to communicate and ask for help are also extremely important because astronomy includes a lot of people looking at the same thing and seeing different details that need to be shared.
  • [student:] The most surprising thing that I learned and did not anticipate was the amount of diversity that was present. I would have never guessed that you didn’t need some sort of astronomical background to be a part of the astronomical community.

Summer Visit - 2016 - LLAMMa