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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

  • I thought that the way the group handled increased independence during days three and four was both important and interesting. Important because it showed us that we didn’t need as much handholding as maybe some of us thought.
  • I find it amazing that a group of individuals, from across the nation, with a variety of different backgrounds can cooperatively produce a research project in one year. I learned the research was not only about being able to master [..] the discipline but actively engage in group-supporting soft skills. I learned more about star formation and SEDs than I ever thought possible.
  • [student:] I was surprised at how excited I got when we finally came up with our first list of new YSO candidates. There was this electricity in the air and everyone felt very excited and relieved. I was also surprised at how fast the days went. Time seemed to fly by when we were working together.
  • This week changed the way I think about astronomy quite a bit and that's sorta what I wanted out of the program when I applied. I'm used to teaching intro astronomy from a textbook and using a lot of simulations as lab activities, but rarely using real data (even in canned activities). My experience [...] a few years back gave me a taste of astronomy research. That is, I got the chance to see data being gathered [...] However, that was where the experience ended. I did not have the opportunity to see how the data was processed or turned eventually into a research paper. This NITARP experience has been a nice complement to my [past] experience and may be a stepping stone for me to do additional research in pursuit of an advanced degree.
  • Nothing really happened that I didn’t anticipate. I came in thinking it was going to be an intense busy week filled with learning astrophysics and the trip did not disappoint.

Related Teams

Summer Visit - 2019 - IDYL