Job title: Graduate Student
School: Kapolei High School
What does Maunakea Scholars mean to you?
Maunakea scholars, to me, is a way for me to both give back to the community and inspire rising students to study astronomy, just like I was inspired to study astronomy in high school through a meeting with an astronomy graduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. In addition, I would have loved to have had an opportunity to apply for time on telescopes, such as those on Maunakea, as a high school student, and I enjoy assisting the students in accomplishing their creative research goals!
What do you think Maunakea Scholars means to your students?
I see the excitement, the wonder, and the creative ideas from every student that I have had the pleasure to mentor over the past two years.
Are there any particular stories of projects you would like to share?
There is not any particular story that comes to mind, but I will say that I am consistently impressed by the brilliant ideas many of the students have brought to me. When I think back to the sorts of things I was doing in high school, I know I would have struggled to come up with similarly novel ideas of appropriate scope.