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

If it were possible to speak to congress (or others) about the impact NITARP has had on myself and my students, I would have to start with it being life changing. For myself the experience has been a needed confirmation that the traditional process of science education in primary and secondary education in ineffective and that there are far better methods. The first and foremost being to have students participate in real authentic research work and learn the needed knowledge in a context of its use and application. I have seen students that would never have considered science a favorite subject excel and push themselves harder because it is ‘real’. I have completely changed my teaching style to reflect this and include real research in all my classes. Student participate, motivations, and enthusiasm have increased across the board. For students I can point to several that have had a complete change in their future prospects and ambitions due to exposure to the NITARP program. Directly or indirectly, they have seen themselves as having a real attainable part of science or technology based career. For some this will push them to be the first in their family to attend college of any kind, for others the first to look at a career outside the trades, for others an encouraging push to continue their efforts and look at what will be. Programs like NITARP provide teachers and students opportunities that really get to the core of STEM education and what STEM should be. They should be supported and encouraged.
The NITARP model of mentorship deserves to be replicated by other programs and agencies.
[student:] I didn't expect that we would grow so close after connecting during just 5 days.
[student:] There are so many parts and places and people working on the same thing but in lots of different ways. I better understand why adults go to conferences and why they are important – so many ideas and people talking about their work.
[student:] This overall experience has taught me be to be diligent and to not procrastinate with my work and homework, it has taught me to thoroughly answer everything and ask for help when I need it.

AAS - 2017

Quotes

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