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Summer Visit - 2012 - C-WAYS

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 C-WAYS team came to visit in July 2012. The core team educators attended, plus 12 students, and two additional scientists.  Dr. JD Armstrong (LCOGT/UH) and Dr. Babar Ali (IPAC) also assissted.

Quotes

  • [student:] I had a newfound view of the work that astronomers must do to gather the answers they seek.
  • I was surprised to see the amount of work was needed for a seemingly small job. To have stayed for such a short amount of time and to have done so much work [..] was overwhelming.
  • The entire experience was "real astronomy." Nothing was canned. None of us in the room knew what the "final answer" was. Students really buy into the fact that this is real research.
  • Real Astronomy is doing all the data research. It is not just about viewing [through] a telescope. It's about reading the numbers and understanding it.
  • I know astronomy relies on computer programming skills, but I was surprised to learn how much it relies on them.

Related Teams

Summer Visit - 2012 - C-WAYS