UT Austin Astronomy Graduate Student Postdoc Seminar (GSPS), Spring 2016

Every other Friday, 3:30-4:30pm, in the Astro Classroom (15.216B) or Evans Conference Room (15.202A)

Past semesters:

Description/Motivation (cribbed from UC Berkeley's GSPS page):

GSPS is a place where students and postdocs can practice giving talks or share information and knowledge that others might not have.
Topics of the presentations can be just about anything: their own research (either completed or commencing), career advancement and advice, pedagogy and teaching, practice/job talks, software packages/languages and apps, topics that aren't usually covered in other seminars, etc.
GSPS meets every other week during the semester (modulo University holidays).
There will be one main presentation/talk/workshop each session, led by one to a few people.
Presentations should leave plenty of time for group work and/or discussion and questions.
Presentations should emphasize background material so everyone is on the same page.
No faculty allowed. Only graduate students, postdocs, and early career research staff are allowed.
GSPS is a good place to:
- promote community between grad students and postdocs
- practice speaking and discussing your research
- feel comfortable asking lots of questions
- learn about topics outside your own research
- learn about new techniques and tools for research
- learn about applicable non-science topics
If you would like feedback on your presentation, the organizer(s) would be happy to take notes and discuss it with you afterwards (and/or ask other audience members to do so).

Organizers: Jeffrey Silverman (JSilverman{at}astro{dot}as{dot}utexas{dot}edu) & Matt Stevans (Stevans{at}astro{dot}as{dot}utexas{dot}edu). Please contact us if you have questions, comments, complaints, or requests for future topics or snacks and thanks for participating in GSPS!

Current Semester Schedule:

Date	Presenter(s)	Topic/Title	Location
1/29	Kevin Gullikson, et al. Raquel Martinez	UT Astro Hack Day 2016 Results CNS Graduate Education Call for Comments	Astro Classroom
2/12	Steve Finkelstein, Adam Kraus, & Andrew Mann	CV/resume advice/roast	Astro Classroom
3/4	Brian Mulligan	Optimizing & Profiling Code (in Python)	Astro Classroom
3/11	Joel Green	How we prepare the public for the new frontiers of astronomy: E/PO & Non-Faculty Astronomy Jobs	Astro Classroom
4/1	Various Discussion Leaders	The State of the Astro Grads & Postdocs	Astro Classroom
4/22	Briana Indahl	RLM's Astronomy Mini Museum	Astro Classroom
4/29	Chao-Ling Hung, Aaron Smith, & Adam McKay	Summary of Institute for Scientist & Engineer Educators Professional Development Program	Astro Classroom
5/6	Dave Pooley	The Long and Winding Road...to My Dream Job	Astro Classroom

Possible other topics (in no particular order):

another CV roast
good interview skills
non-academic job market info (preparing, applying, resumes, interviewing, details of the job, etc.)
Insight Data Science Fellows Program (Emily McLinden)
scientific ethics
putting together good posters (PowerPoint, Adobe InDesign)
astro-related social media, AstroBetter, astro blogs, blogging, Tweeting, YouTubing
asking questions and getting responses on Facebook (Kevin Gullikson?)
posting talks and slides online (speakerdeck, slideshare)
how astronomers use Python, a collaboration with Continuum (Kris Overholt & Peter Wang)
coding/software (bitbucket, Flash, MESA, Cloudy, runmycode, astroML, MCMC, emcee, Papers2, rescuetime, productivity suites, BibDesk, JabRef, zotero, PHP)
what's your software stack and why? what tools do you use for which tasks?
what do you want improved so that you can put out more papers?
CS and/or stat department mixer
basic Korean
preview of next semester's colloquia

Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number AST-1302771.