Outreach
One of my favorite parts of my job is teaching and talking to people about science. Feel free to contact me for more information about anything below, and/or if you are looking for help in organizing or conducting outreach.
Here is a recent example of a public talk I gave remotely for Boise State’s First Friday Astronomy series, in November 2021. This was right before the launch of the JWST, so I talked about “The Current & Future Landscape of Small Exoplanet Demographics” and some ways JWST will contribute to growing our knowledge about small planets.
As a postdoc, I gave a public talk at the Huntington Library in Pasadena, as part of Carnegie Observatories’ Astronomy Lecture Series. My talk was about "Exoplanet Genetics," and the blurb was: How do we find planets orbiting stars other than our Sun? How do we know what they’re made of, or if they’re Earth-like? Dr. Teske will discuss how exoplanets’ composition is “inherited” from their host star ‘’genes,” and will highlight new exoplanet discoveries and the Carnegie Institution’s pivotal role in understanding exoplanet formation and composition.
I also gave one of the talks at Carnegie Observatories' Open House on October 16, 2016. Our open house theme was spectroscopy! Most of my research relies on spectroscopy, so it was really fun to give this talk to such an engaged audience.
Stepping outside my comfort zone and toward Hollywood, in 2018 help edit the script for an episode of "The Habitable Zone", a space science education series created through Caltech/IPAC for youth, families, and lifelong learners. I got to meet the stars of the episode, Cas Anvar & Cara Gee of "The Expanse", and watch the filming! Later on, I was invited to back to film a "behind the sci-fi" look at the episode with Robert Hurt and Calla Cofield.
I was also a guest expert in an episode of “Lost LA”, a local PBS TV show covering hidden treasures throughout Los Angeles, about Mt. Wilson Observatory and Carnegie’s collection of glass plates. I think it turned out really well, check it out below!
In 2017 I spoke at two Astronomy on Tap events, one in Pasadena when I talked about Vera Rubin (whom I knew and looked up to) and how she should have been awarded a Nobel Prize, and one in Austin when I talked about "Sbaseball: How The World Series Would Look on Other Planets." It was a homerun!
I started a blog a few years ago about women observers, engineers, instrument builders, and operators working at Las Campanas Observatory, called Las Campanas Belles. If you are a woman and have worked at Las Campanas, please let me know if you would like to contribute to the blog!
As a postdoc at Carnegie Observatories, I started a new partnership with Cal Poly Pomona's branch of Upward Bound, a national program funded by the U.S. Department of Education that helps prepare high school students for success in post-secondary education, free of charge. From their website, "The goal of UB is to provide assistance to eligible high school students who demonstrate potential to succeed in college. Eligible participants must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents, be economically disadvantaged, and be a potential first generation to college student." This is really an amazing program that I've had the privilege to see first hand. It's year-round for four years, and provides after school tutoring, parent conferences, one-on-one bi-monthly advising, workshops about "how to apply for colleges, financial literacy and financing college education, career interests and goal setting, leadership and life skills, time management and study skills, and workshops designed to prepare students for tests such as the SAT and ACT," and a 6-week residential experience at Cal Poly Pomona over the summer. In the summer of 2017, UB Math & Science students visited Carnegie Observatories on a field trip! They went on an interactive tour of our machine and electronics shops, heard about the history of astronomy in Pasadena from Cindy Hunt, and got to ask questions to a panel of our undergraduate summer interns (all of them participated voluntarily!) about applying to and succeeding in college. Then we followed up with a star party at Cal Poly Pomona, which the undergrad interns also helped facilitate.
In summer 2018 we expanded -- UB students visited our campus to participate in inquiry activities and met with our undergraduate interns, and took a trip to Mt. Wilson to look through the 100'' and 60'' telescopes that helped ``discover the universe''. We also be hosted another star party at CPP, this time for over 200 people! It was great to involve the undergraduate and graduate students more in the planning and facilitation of these outreach activities. We have continued this partnership in summer 2019, with plans for 2020. You can read more about this program in an article I wrote for the Carnegie Observatories fall 2018 newsletter.
As a postdoc at Carnegie DTM, I was a regular volunteer at Carnegie First Light, a free Saturday science program for DC middle schools students (grades 6-8). The Carnegie First Light program, part of the larger Carnegie Academy for Science Education (CASE), was founded in 1989 by former Carnegie President Maxine Singer. CASE is housed at Carnegie Headquarters in downtown Washington, DC, within the community it seeks to serve, and was run for years by Dr. Julie Edmonds. You can read more about Carnegie's commitment to STEM education here (including a small quote from me on page 23). The First Light Program serves ~25 students per year; enrollment is completely open to any DC student, with preference for students who are continuing participation.
Each school-year session is dedicated to a different theme related to astrobiology, and populated with hands-on science activities, experiments, and field trips. Last year, 2014-15, the theme was robotics. Students designed, built, and programmed their own robotic creations with LEGO Mindstorms kits. By the end of the term, every student was able to navigate their robot through an obstacle course including turning, backing up, recognizing barriers, recognizing colors, and making sounds.
Over 2015-16, we explored light -- what it is, how it behaves and why, and how it is used in different ways by astronomers to learn about the universe. We also partnered for the first time with Howard University to host four undergraduate Physics majors as workshop facilitators and mentors. They quickly became a vital part of the program.
In graduate school, I volunteered a lot with Girl Scouts of Southern Arizona, judged science fairs, lead demos and stations at “science day” events, helped with Astronomy Camps (and here) and the bi-annual Expanding Your Horizons Conference. Below are photos of some of these outreach experiences. I am a member of the inaugural class of the AAS Ambassadors, have participated in multiple CAE Workshops (as well some research and some more), and am an occasional blogger for WomenInAstronomy and AstroBetter (and helper with the wiki).
