"Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing.": January 7

Today was an extremely full day from the morning session at 8:30 until now… 10:30. I’m very tired.

The morning talk was on the Spitzer telescope, and here are the few things I thought were the most interesting. 1. the planned science seemed kind of boring to me. 2. the unplanned science was really, really cool. 3. Spitzer’s been around a very long time… the original scientists were chosen the year I was born!

Packed house for Spitzer!

I went to the exhibit hall for a few minutes to learn about an aperture tool at the IPAC booth, then headed up to a session I was really interested in…” Research Based Initiatives for Broadening the Participation of Women and Minorities in Astronomy.” The programs were great, and I can’t wait to look into this one: http://www.astro.washington.edu/users/premap/. However, I did find it a bit interesting that out of the five presenters, all five of them were men. The programs were all new, and there were several for undergrad, grad and PhD students. I enjoyed the one presenter in particular because not only did he talk about how the STEM “leaky pipe” graphic isn’t quite accurate (which I totally agree with) he also had us do a think-pair-share and I think the best presenters are the ones who get the audience involved.

I went to lunch with 2 other NITARPers not on my team, and again, I really think that the 18 of us are really cool. We had a great view of Long Beach, some delicious food, and some great conversations about teaching and science.

Lunch in Long Beach!

I wandered around the exhibit floor for awhile, got to see a ridiculously cool model of the JWST mirrors that you could stand near and if you looked from the correct place at the correct angle, it reflected to show you the actual size. Here's a photo, obviously I was very excited :)

me in front of the JWST mirror display

I talked to several astronomers who work with radio telescopes in the Netherlands, gamma ray telescopes, and the Arecibo observatory in Puerto Rico. I asked all of them if they had teacher programs… hey, why not? Arecibo does, but only for local teachers, and the man at the booth discussed how there would be a language barrier anyway because all of their professional development is presented in Spanish. I also found out some cool information about the Hubble Legacy Archive and their education resources, you can check them out here: http://hla.stsci.edu/hla_helpcenter.html .

I checked out a few posters from the scientists that work with NITARP, and one of them had the best photo of Pluto ever taken from the ground. The other was cool because even though when I walked up I had minimal knowledge of the basics of the research; by the time I left I had a ton of questions… which I think is a good sign of good science. I’m really excited to see more posters tomorrow, not only to learn things about the research, but also to practice talking to people and asking good questions.

After, I went to a session with my mentor teacher, Sally Seebode who developed a google doc spreadsheet that can be used with the students to help introduce stellar classifications/distances/brightness/all kinds of other things. I’m really hoping to use it in class.

Sally teaching at the IPAC booth

I’m a little upset I missed the Town Hall session I planned to attend, but I just needed a break so I came back to the hotel for a little while. I headed out about an hour later to dinner with the teacher members of my team, during which we had a conversation about social media and education. I really wish everyone could see how powerful of a tool Twitter really is when it comes to learning and communicating.

To end the day, we had one last official NITARP session. It was a finishing up of 2012 with advice for 2013. Though I did think it was helpful to meet new people and have time to talk to them, I don’t think it was completely beneficial to everyone because all of the teams are so different and everyone is in such a different place in their NITARP journey. It may have been better to structure it a different way, but in the end present to us some best practices that you can take or leave, depending on your situation. What I found most beneficial was talking to the students. They were smart, well spoken, honest, knowledgeable, and I can’t wait to pick the students who will be working with me to get started. Goodnight!

Tweets... again, start at the bottom :)

7 Jan