Astronomy is inherently a small field, practiced by relatively few people. At the Space Telescope Science Institute, there are a little over a dozen summer interns in total. This allows for a closely-knit community and, subsequently, a lot of interaction with our peers and mentors. Contact with mentors is in fact almost a necessity in a field as small as astronomy, since these mentors are our primary source for career information and support.
Fortunately, the size of the workplace keeps things fairly informal. Everyone knows everyone, and you can always overhear some laughter or some joke being made. To put it differently, it is easy to get to know people at STScI, regardless of their position at the Institute. Meeting with professors and scientists, even those we do not directly work with, is remarkably easy. STScI even try to get us to communicate with potential mentors through their weekly lecture series, provided exclusively to the summer interns.
Through that lecture series, I have gotten the opportunity to meet world-renowned scientists and science popularizers, including the famous author Mario Livio. In this lecture series, we get to listen to a 1 hour lecture by someone at the Institute who may talk about their research, some interesting astronomy topic, or some recent cutting-edge developments in the astrophysics community. Having been to several of these lectures already, I can see why they organize them.
Mario Livio's lecture, entitled "Brilliant Blunders" after his most recent book, struck me as particularly important. In it he describes brilliant scientists, some of whom are household names (such as Einstein and Darwin), who committed pretty big blunders in their careers. The message I got from this is that the path in science is riddled with obstacles. It is not straightforward as the media makes it seem. It is not a simple "get an idea then win a Nobel Prize" scenario. Science is incremental, and difficult, and frustrating. It is done in small steps, and every now and then you may get that "eureka" moment.
A talk like that is invaluable to someone in my position; it is very important, as an aspiring astronomer, to hear of this first hand from an experienced astronomer. I now have better expectations of what it means to be a scientist. I can feel more relaxed now when I come across obstacles at work, since that happens more often than not! I learned that it is part of science to make mistakes and learn from them. It is not a problem I have, but rather a problem deeply rooted in a field where most of what you do is being done for the first time.
To wrap up, I feel that my mentors are doing their best to ensure that we are well-prepared as astronomers, that we know what is expected of us, and that we have realistic (and at the same time ambitious) goals for ourselves. More so given how easy it is to come into contact with our mentors!
Fortunately, the size of the workplace keeps things fairly informal. Everyone knows everyone, and you can always overhear some laughter or some joke being made. To put it differently, it is easy to get to know people at STScI, regardless of their position at the Institute. Meeting with professors and scientists, even those we do not directly work with, is remarkably easy. STScI even try to get us to communicate with potential mentors through their weekly lecture series, provided exclusively to the summer interns.
Through that lecture series, I have gotten the opportunity to meet world-renowned scientists and science popularizers, including the famous author Mario Livio. In this lecture series, we get to listen to a 1 hour lecture by someone at the Institute who may talk about their research, some interesting astronomy topic, or some recent cutting-edge developments in the astrophysics community. Having been to several of these lectures already, I can see why they organize them.
Mario Livio's lecture, entitled "Brilliant Blunders" after his most recent book, struck me as particularly important. In it he describes brilliant scientists, some of whom are household names (such as Einstein and Darwin), who committed pretty big blunders in their careers. The message I got from this is that the path in science is riddled with obstacles. It is not straightforward as the media makes it seem. It is not a simple "get an idea then win a Nobel Prize" scenario. Science is incremental, and difficult, and frustrating. It is done in small steps, and every now and then you may get that "eureka" moment.
A talk like that is invaluable to someone in my position; it is very important, as an aspiring astronomer, to hear of this first hand from an experienced astronomer. I now have better expectations of what it means to be a scientist. I can feel more relaxed now when I come across obstacles at work, since that happens more often than not! I learned that it is part of science to make mistakes and learn from them. It is not a problem I have, but rather a problem deeply rooted in a field where most of what you do is being done for the first time.
To wrap up, I feel that my mentors are doing their best to ensure that we are well-prepared as astronomers, that we know what is expected of us, and that we have realistic (and at the same time ambitious) goals for ourselves. More so given how easy it is to come into contact with our mentors!
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