Introduction to Astronomy Research for Undergraduates

Intro2Astro Research is a free, online summer program that aims to provide first and second year undergraduates and transfer students the basic research skills needed to obtain independent research opportunities. The curriculum is focused on exoplanet research, but utilizes broadly useful tools such as online data queries from the Gaia and TESS missions as well as version control, basic unix and Jupyter notebooks. This eight-week program consists of live and recorded coding tutorials by graduate student mentors, research paper discussions, homework assignments, and mock research proposals. Professional development topics include how to apply for paid internships, how to apply to graduate school, and developing your online research presence. The course has doubled in size each of the last two years and students participated from 5 foreign countries and 15 different states. The goal of the course is to prepare students to be competitive for paid internships in competitive scenarios. We are recruiting both undergraduates as students in the course and graduate students to lead topics as mentors. No prerequisites are required, students of all levels are welcome. Everything is online.