• NASA
  • IPAC

AAS - 2024

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 2023 and 2024 NITARP teams attended the 2024 January AAS meeting in New Orleans, LA. The 2023 class was presenting results and the 2024 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 press release on NITARP from the AAS, and the special online article about NITARP at the AAS. All of the posters we presented are here. (In addition to the iPoster sessions as listed here, the physical versions of the 2023 teams' posters were up at the IPAC booth all day Tuesday.)

2023 teams:

Alumni:

  • 167.01 Sperling et al., Student-Led High Altitude Ballooning into Solar Eclipses (Monday 5:30-6:30)
  • 171.03 Rebull et al., NITARP Lesson Plans: Bite-Size Pieces of Authentic Science Research Experiences (Monday 5:30-6:30)
  • 171.06 Newland, Using Google Colab to Teach Hubble-Lemaitre's Law with BOSS Data (Monday 5:30-6:30)
  • 176.02 Rebull et al., Young Stellar Object Candidates in IC 417 (Monday 5:30-6:30)
  • 203.03 Wojciak et al., Exploring Color-Magnitude Relationships Among Quasars with z between 1.5-1.75 (Tuesday 9-10)
  • 458.21 Jones & Rutherford, The Three-Dimensional Structure of IC 2391 (Thursday 1-2)

Quotes

  • The most interesting thing was getting to present to a variety of different people at AAS and meet so many folks. I felt like an expert because I was an expert at that point.
  • [student:] NITARP is a one-in-a-million experience. Students have the opportunity to engage in real astronomy research with professionals in the field and can gain a true understanding of what astronomy as a discipline looks like.
  • I realized being an expert in one field doesn’t necessarily make you an expert in all astro fields. I realized that each subfield had a community of astronomers who were familiar with each other’s work. And I began to see the small but vibrant community of NITARPers out there, doing their thing and helping each other out, as well as helping the next generation of teachers and students alike. I hope that I may grow into that.
  • The most interesting thing I did (fyi, this is like picking between ice cream sundaes and chocolate cake for dessert) was listening to the students present their posters at the iPoster sessions and the IPAC booth. What was interesting to me was their absolute ownership of the work which I am excited about for my own students (as well as for myself). I also enjoyed learning about the science and process behind their work.
  • I still think attending AAS is the most interesting part of the experience. As a teacher, watching the subject you teach grow and change right before your eyes is pretty incredible, and as a non-professional astronomer, being so fully embraced by the professional community is a huge ego boost. :)

Related Teams

AAS - 2024