Workshops

Know Your Power Project + Special Session

Collaborators: Lauren Chambers + Dra. Nicole Cabrera Salazar

The Know Your Power Project seeks to understand the distribution of power throughout the academic ecosystem in order to bolster greater equity in Astronomy. By focusing our attention on the many paths toward positive change as well as our collective knowledge, we hope to a) provide a list of concrete actions for creating inclusive spaces and b) lay the groundwork for sustainable collaboration with regard to equity and inclusion. At the 233rd AAS Meeting, my collaborators and I led a Special Session in which we first spoke with a panel of astronomy at various career stages about the types of power that they find accessible in their position. We then facilitated small group discussions about understanding our own power, how we hold ourselves accountable, and how we can work with Astronomers at different career stages than ourselves to achieve our collective goals. Main Document.

How to Build & Publish a Website in 60 Minutes

Collaborators: Steven Stetzler + Lauren Chambers

Personal websites also provide a space for scientists to a) host and share analysis tools and open source software, b) share accessible explanations of their own research with the public through the practice of blogging, and c) enable instructors to move their course materials online into an open and shareable space, enhancing the online presence and shareability of their teaching materials. At the 233rd AAS Meeting, my collaborators and I hosted a website-building workshop, providing personal assistance and instruction to AAS members in website development, enabling them to successfully build and publish a personal website within 60 minutes. Tutorial.

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Outreach

Data-Driven Astronomy in the 2020s & Beyond

Astronomy on Tap Seattle

Astronomy faces an impending data revolution with the advent of massive 'time domain surveys': telescopes that repeatedly observe the entire night sky, detecting cosmic evolution over the course of weeks, months, and years. One of these surveys, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) promises to observe billions of objects over the next decade. This tsunami of data collection will create opportunities to explore astrophysical frontiers; however, to harness these opportunities, astronomers must systematically identify noteworthy objects from among the tsunami. Talk.

Seeking out Mentors and Surviving Disappointment

Get This Girl a Job Podcast

I was interviewed by my friend Katie Melbourne for her podcast, Get This Girl a Job, in which she interviews recent college graduates about how they navigated their first professional jobs. We discussed advice for seeking out mentors and building relationships with people that can help you acheive your goals. Podcast episode.

Teen Astronomy Cafe

National Optical Astronomy Observatory

While at NOAO, I participated in the Teen Astronomy Cafe Program, which leads high scool students through a series of lectures and computational activities that explore astronomical research questions. Together with Dr. Stephanie Juneau, I co-wrote and co-lead a Jupyter Notebook activity that taught students about spectroscopy, redshift, and large-scale structure through the incorporation of real SDSS data samples.

Expanding Your Horizons Conference

University of Wisconsin-Madison

The Expanding Your Horizons Conference is a recurring one-day event that introduces middle school-age girls to career opportunities within STEM. With the graduate student organization Women of Wisconsin Strengthening Astronomy (WOWSA), we designed a series of activities that highlighted astronomical techniques at distinct wavelength regimes. I personally engaged girls in a discussion about infrared light and the capabilities of infrared telescopes.

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Resources

Questions for Graduate Programs

AstroBetter Contribution

An extensive compilation of questions for prospective graduate students to consider when deciding which graduate school to attend. The questions originated from this Twitter thread by Dra. Nicole Cabrera Salazar and this Twitter thread by Nadirah Farah Foley, and were later supplemented with individual contributions. This is intended to be a living document, to which anyone can contribute. Document.

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Elements

i = 0;

while (!deck.isInOrder()) {
    print 'Iteration ' + i;
    deck.shuffle();
    i++;
}

print 'It took ' + i + ' iterations to sort the deck.';