A week ago, to many of us, New Mexico was a barren wasteland. Now it’s a barren wasteland inside of an oven with Mother Nature’s wrath. And despite the lack of stereotypical cowboys, perhaps we’ve made our own lassos, though personally I’m not too sure what I’m trying to catch. Hopefully, it’s ice cream.

We’ve all had our fair share of losses, whether that be missing keys, the formidable staircase down to the dining hall, or boggled minds over problem sets. Sign me up for academic torture… Or maybe in the case of my roommate (shoutout Gautam), it’s the cruel mosquitoes coming for an absolute all-you-can-eat buffet. Who knew these cries of help would be a social link among desperate juniors (hey, us sophomores count as one now… right?).

Summing up the experience with Matt Damon, 

“What the F word, F word in gerund form”

But this first week of “juvie” has knocked some sense into us too. No more waking up at noon on the weekdays is a downside, but we get to look at the stars past midnight and pretend we’re astronomers (or really just sleep-deprived students). I’ve gotten the chance to explore my geographical abilities as I trod across the daytime boundaries along the path to getting lost. But if two roads ever so diverged in the yellow woods, I’ll for sure take SSP about 65 of 70 times.

We find something new to learn everyday. Maybe it’s Dr. Anderson’s fun little exercise or Dr. Rengstorf (drip master)’s undying love for Chinese Instagram Reels. I’ve seen history being made with an intense match of bottle-wallet pool, heard the melodious voice of guest speakers that seem to model a lullaby, tasted pork butt, touched grass (not really), and smelled a mysterious niff that roams across the boys’ dorm hallways. Some of us have uncovered a sleepwalking killer instinct, the rage of broken laundry machines, or an ability to cram things last minute after avoiding problem sets like the plague.

So… inmates, we’ll definitely manage or even thrive in the month we have left. If not, I guess Charles Darwin was right about natural selection.

I conclude:

“This is trivial…. No one can stop me.” – Dr. Anderson

About Me:

Hi, my name is Joshua and I’m a rising junior at Oxford Academy located in Southern California. I’m a math enthusiast (yikes, I know) but also a fan of tennis and photography. At SSP, you might find me playing ping-pong (I can feel my mediocre tennis deteriorating by the second) or having a crisis about astronomy’s existence (probably a big practical joke by aliens).

The post Lost and Found first appeared on SSP International.

Hi everyone–Jayden here. New Mexico is too cold.

I’m genuinely being serious. Ask anyone else from SSP NMSU; they’ll all… well, they might not admit that it’s cold, but they’ll at least tell you how often I complain about being cold. If you need any more reference: I was playing frisbee in a black hoodie and denim jacket in (apparently!) 100 degree heat and I was cold. To be completely honest, I think there’s a conspiracy at play here. Think about it: NMSU is obviously the best SSP campus (even the other campuses agree!), and if not for the infamous New Mexico climate, SSPlicants every year would likely be swarming to attend SSP NMSU. The only thing keeping them at bay are the fabricated climate reports.

Aaaanyways, I think I probably said too much. But we all know how to keep a secret, right?

Besides the cold, though, SSP at NMSU is… honestly amazing. There are too many things to talk about in one post, but I’ll try to list some of my most memorable moments!

First: Stars.

But not the astronomy type of stars! For the past few days, my colleagues have been manufacturing hundreds(?) of paper stars daily. Not during lecture, of course!

I’m proud to say that I was the pioneer and supplier of the star production movement, with most of our stars being created from my own stash of star paper. If you’re not too sure what paper stars look like, I’ve attached a small sample of our production below. The rest are hidden somewhere, but you’re not allowed to know where quite yet.

Next! Lectures!

Our lectures have genuinely been amazing. Or so they say. I’m not sure, because I don’t understand 75% of the things we’re told. The other 25% is the jokes that Drs. Rengstorf, Andersen, and Bauer tell. They never miss, by the way. Never.

Third… Frisbee.

Nevermind. If you know, you know.

Well then… PSets!

…actually, I think I’ll skip this one too. I’m not ready to talk about them. I don’t think I’ll ever be.

Maybe I don’t have so much to talk about after all. I’ll leave the other interesting topics for my fellow colleagues to talk about in their own blogs, I guess. 

Before I end off, however, I definitely need to take a moment to talk about our amazing faculty and TAs. Along with the aforementioned Drs. Rengstorf, Andersen, and Bauer, I have to thank Ms. Martinez, Benji, Kathryn, Joel, and Lara for all of their support through our first week of the program. They’re all a huge part of what makes NMSU the best SSP campus, and I can’t thank them enough for all they do for us.

And… well, to end off, I’m kind of sad that each of us only write one blog post. Writing this was honestly really fun, even if I kind of had to rush to finish this. Maybe I should start a petition to let us write more blogs?

Anyways, as I’m writing this, I realized that I’m not too sure how to best end this blog post. Honestly, I’m regretting not writing more. Even though I’ve been here for only a week, there’s so so so much more to talk about. But this is getting pretty long. 546 words at the end of this sentence? And I have trouble writing 200 word essays in school?

Whatever.

If you’re traveling to New Mexico anytime soon, please be sure to dress warmly!

Have a great day, everyone!

Jayden

About me:

Hi! I’m Jayden. Whenever people ask for fun facts about me, my default responses are that I’m colorblind and that I have two brothers. I love talking and getting to know people, and I’m so glad to work with all of my peers at SSP!

The post They all told me New Mexico would be hot. first appeared on SSP International.

The one thing I didn’t procrastinate at all on, I realized I did completely wrong.

 

When we first learned about the blog posts, I immediately started planning out mine: how great the program was, how I loved learning about astronomy (something I don’t have much experience with), and how much I loved the people. Don’t get me wrong — all of those are still true — but I don’t think what I had planned was nearly enough to capture my genuine thoughts about the program.

 

Starting on the first day, we were already completing asteroid proposals while clicking through countless JPL Horizons settings. To be completely honest, I had no idea what we were doing for a solid two hours. Normally, similar proposals would probably take at least three days at school, but we were only given one. I knew SSP was going to be difficult, but I was still taken aback by exactly how hard it was. One of my most common thoughts throughout the week has been, “I don’t understand this, but it seems so cool.” Everything seemed like it would make sense… until I really thought about it. Maybe it’s because I had done little astronomy before the program. Maybe it’s because what we learned forced us to view Earth and time in a completely different way from what we were used to. Or maybe it’s because I was tired from the lack of sleep. Either way, I would be lying if I said that everything just clicked as soon as I learned it.

And yet, despite the utter confusion and frustration that I felt while working through some of our assignments, I found myself enjoying all of it. From the “ding dong choir” to random drawings on a shared screen (ha ha ha I really tried to remove my background for Dr. Tarter’s talk but I’m kinda bad with zoom sometimes and failed miserably), SSP has already become an experience unlike any other. Even though my computer might explode any day from zoom, vscode (especially vpython), and 100000 chrome tabs open, it is 100% worth it. Or maybe my brain will explode before then, who knows.

 

SSP Online

Having already been through weeks of online school, I was disappointed when I received the email about SSP being online. I was also terrified about how I was going to make new friends without actually seeing any of them in person. However, I was extremely surprised (but in a good way) when my fears proved to be wrong. Below are two pictures of us trying to write out SSP with the telescope app (I tried, but mine didn’t turn out so well LOL).

Everyone here is extremely smart (btw I’m sorry Sarah B for having you explain that one pset problem so many times), but what I find different about them is that it’s not intimidating to talk with them. We’re all here with similar goals, and everyone (including TA’s and the instructors) is extremely supportive and welcoming. Though everyone is trying to do their best, I found the SSP environment to be much more collaborative rather than competitive. Instead of competing against each other to see who can finish the fastest or who can receive the highest grades, we’re all working together so that we can all achieve our goals.

Final thoughts

The first week has been one of the longest, but also fastest, weeks in my life. It was long because I’ve already learned more about astronomy than I had ever before, and because it feels like I have already known everyone for much longer than a week; it was fast because the entire process was so much fun and I genuinely loved the 8+ hours that zoomed by. If even the first week of this program was this amazing, I’m so excited for the coming weeks and what they will bring.

 

Before I end this blog post, I just wanted to say one last thing: watch kdramas (ESPECIALLY crash landing on you, it’s okay to not be okay, or vincenzo)!!!!!

The post The end of the longest, yet fastest week first appeared on SSP International.