Rice distance runner Adolfo Carvalho received an award from the American Astronomical Society. Here's an excerpt from their release:


The latest Chambliss Astronomy Achievement Student Awards poster competition, which occurred in June 2019 during the 234th AAS meeting in St. Louis, Missouri, was not disappointing!

Students had a wide variety of amazing science to discuss. In all, there were 27 students in the competition v 9 undergrads and 18 grads — along with 39 member volunteer judges, encompassing just over 100 judging events!! That’s less than 1/10th the students, judges, and judging events involved in a winter meeting! And with more volunteer judges than students, judges were able to view only half the posters they usually do — thanks to one and all!

As usual, student poster presentations were evaluated during both the morning poster session and evening poster session times of the first three science days of the meeting; in St. Louis, this was Monday through Wednesday.

For many students in the competition, this was their first time presenting at one of our Society meetings, as well as their first time attending one, but you wouldn't know that from the many comments I heard from judges! Chambliss judges tell me that being a judge, and talking with students about their work, was a very rewarding, fun, and gratifying experience, which not only allowed them to interact with students but also allowed them to focus on some science they might not otherwise have the time to.

So, if you haven't signed up to judge student posters in the past, or in a while, I encourage you to do so in the future! Your next opportunity will be at the 235th AAS Meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii, January 2020. The more judges we have, the fewer posters each judge is responsible for judging! My goal is to have 500 judges volunteer!!

Here are the results from St. Louis:

Undergraduate Student Medal Winners

Brian Hybben (University of Missouri)
Adolfo Carvalho (Rice University)