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AAS - 2020

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 2019 and 2020 NITARP teams attended the 2020 January AAS meeting in Honolulu, HI. The 2019 class was presenting results and the 2020 class was starting up. We had 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:

2019 Teams:

NITARP Management:

Returning Alumni Teams:

Quotes

  • [student: The most interesting thing I learned was] The amount of work that astronomers put into research in relation to the small amount of time that they present it.
  • [student: Now,] I feel inspired to work harder and to push myself farther not only in school but throughout my career as well. I also learned that there are many similarities between astronomy and electrical technology. Understanding the data transferred into applications I am learning in the electrical field. Interesting! The sky is no longer the limit.
  • [student:] In terms of my expectations, if we’re talking about the entire NITARP experience it blew them out of the water. Going into this program I didn’t realize anything remotely close to what I did was even on the table.
  • [student:] I think [this experience] changed my whole perspective on scientific research in general. People often tell you about how science is a lot of trial and error, but you never really experience that in a class setting where all your labs are pre-planned. This experience really shed a new light on that process and made the idea of doing new research less daunting.
  • What I’m excited about is building my skillset and credibility as an authentic astronomer in research.

Related Teams

AAS - 2020