School Evaluation

Measuring the impact of our school

We will conduct a process evaluation of the summer school in collaboration with and endorsed by the International Astronomical Union's Office of Astronomy for Development through East Asian Regional Office of Astronomy for Development (EA-ROAD). The evaluation process will consist of asking prospective participants to answer a set of questions to gauge their level of understanding prior to the school, followed by a similar exercise towards the end of the school. This evaluation will offer us an opportunity to measure changes in participants' knowledge and understanding. This collaboration with the EA-ROAD will be useful in developing a framework to assess the efficacy of future summer schools supported by the International Astronomical Union.

We are planning quiz sessions before and after the school lectures to measure the impact of the school. We would like to call for volunteers to join the quiz, which will be also useful to test and remember what you learn.

Monday, 29 June11:00-12:00Itoh Center, 3F Seminar Room
Friday, 3 July15:45-16:45Chemistry Building, 5F Hall

EA-ROAD logo

Questions from participants

We called for questions from the participants during the summer school. Among 15 questions submitted, a prize is given to the following question by Mr. Krittapas Chanchaiworawit (University of Florida).

Question

There are many kind of cosmic distance indicators. Most of them utilize the conservation of energy law in some form or another to build their relations and to be used as distance indicator. Some utilize purely geometry and orientation in space to help us determine their distances. However, which one (or more) of the following pairs of "distance indicator and its observed data" is NOT enough (or wrong) to determine/estimate its distance, given the relations/methods are well-established and no systematics or evolution with cosmology involved.
Hint: Think of the relations/methods they shown either empirically or theoretically, and you will know what you need to observe.

  • (1) AGNs : time lag of flux of its BLR emission lines.
  • (2) Lens galaxy in Gravitational Lensing : Mass distribution profile from the lensing analysis and angular-size to the component with known rotational velocity (kinematics).
  • (3) Cepheid, RR-Lyrae : Light curve in a photometric band (extinction corrected)
  • (4) SNe Ia : Spectra : Its peak bolometric-flux.
  • (5) Geometric Parallax: Precise astrometry over the course of year(s) compared to the background stars or absolute.

Options

  • A) 1 & 2
  • B) 2 Only
  • C) 3 & 4
  • D) 4 Only
  • E) 1 & 4