I'm having to counsel my own kid (a HS senior) that he has to change which schools he's prioritizing in order to hedge his bets because I honestly don't know if "scientist" will be a viable career path in 5 years when he graduates with a BS. (He wants to be a marine biologist.) 😭😱

sure; that makes more sense than a mostly blank "Thanks!" slide. but at least in astronomy, most people put the list of collaborators on the first few slides, as well as citing them (sometimes even with photos if promoting a student/pdoc) throughout the talk. i stand by "leave the summary up!" 🙂

The ugly but direct link to the PDF application instructions is here:
nitarp.ipac.caltech.edu/ckeditor_ass...
This page:
nitarp.ipac.caltech.edu/resource_cat...
has a generalized collection of resources for applicants, including FAQs and a pointer to the application. /end

Whether or not we can run the program in 2026 is contingent on the availability of funds! The application itself consists of short answers to a few questions.

The program involves three trips — an American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting in January 2026, to Pasadena, CA in summer 2026, and the AAS meeting in January 2027. The January 2026 meeting is in Phoenix, AZ; the January 2027 meeting is in Salt Lake City, UT. Most of the work is done remotely.

Most of our educators are HS classroom educators, but 8th grade, community college, and informal educators have participated. We are looking for educators who already know the basics of astronomy, & are interested in learning exactly how astronomy research is conducted. Educators must be US-based.

NITARP, the NASA/IPAC Teacher Archive Research Program, gets teachers involved in authentic astronomical research. We partner small groups of educators with a mentor professional astronomer for an original research project.

my father once had to go through the lengthy tech support checklist with them (reboot this, reboot that, etc) even though he kept telling them, "the cable is physically detached from the house. the cable is in the street. the cable is literally being run over by cars. you need to send someone..."

😲 Whoa! Why? I mean, I understand if whales are, you know, moving with the water (tides) but that's daily, not monthly. Are they following food that is responding to lunar illumination fraction at night? And *solar cycles*?? How interesting!!

:) :) I mean I do give talks, both at conferences and a la carte, but not this week, so my first thought was “what video did they find?” But it doesn’t seem like this is an astronomy conference. It looks like an interesting talk though!!

Not me! 😀 wrong tag…

If you see this, post the most recent photo of yourself from your camera roll. No cheating!

If you see this, post the most recent photo of yourself from your camera roll. No cheating!