Pasadena High School Students Participate in Caltech Planet Finder Academy
On Thursday, eight of Pasadena High School’s finest Bulldogs joined 19 other PUSD students at Caltech Keck Planet FinDer Academy Student Summer Program (PFA)! The PFA is a week of intensive instruction on the astronomical techniques used to find planets outside the solar system.
These Bulldogs will follow up this amazing week with eight sessions throughout the year. Instructors include Caltech faculty and grad students in astronomy! Congrats to these Bulldogs for their “astronomical” achievement: Aileen Cisneros, Amber Wang, Andrew Hegger, Anton Perez, Evan Wilson, Iyan Syeed-Miller, Matthew Paz and Ronan Anderton.
About Caltech Planet FinDER Academy Program
The Caltech Planet Finder Academy (PFA) will provide 30 PUSD high school students with a deep dive into the field of astronomy, with an emphasis on building a foundation in exoplanet science and data analysis. Topics of study will include telescopes; the scale of planets, galaxies, and the universe; physics of planets; and spectroscopy. Participants will also learn about research trends, career options/and the college application process. The program will consist of a week-long intensive summer experience at Caltech and a series of eight half-day sessions on campus throughout the school year. Utilizing a group project/collaborative learning format, the program will include instruction and practice in coding and data analysis, discussion sessions with local astronomers, exercises designed to encourage and broaden exposure to careers in science, and site visits to JPL, Carnegie Observatories, Mount Wilson Observatory, Palomar Observatory, and the Thirty Meter Telescope offices. For more information, email Mitch Aiken – Associate Director for Educational Outreach at Caltech at aiken@caltech.edu.
Pasadena High School, 2925 E. Sierra Madre Blvd., Pasadena, (626) 396-5880 or visit www.pusd.us/phs.
