UC Santa Cruz Science Internship Program (SIP) – Astronomy & Astrophysics Track
A 9-week summer research internship at UC Santa Cruz that pairs high school students (ages 14-17) one-on-one with UCSC astronomy faculty and graduate mentors on real astrophysics projects, such as mapping galaxy environments with James Webb Space Telescope data or studying stellar populations in M31/M33.
You might also like
Foothill College Astronomy Program (Dual Enrollment)
High school students in grades 9-12 can dual-enroll tuition-free in Foothill College's transferable astronomy sequence (General Astronomy: Solar System; Stars, Galaxies & Cosmology; and the Astronomy Laboratory), which includes hands-on observational and data-analysis projects using real astronomical equipment.
Silicon Valley Astronomy Lecture Series
A free public lecture series founded in 1999 at Foothill College featuring leading astronomers, including Nobel laureates and National Academy of Sciences members, presented six Wednesday evenings each academic year and co-sponsored by the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, SETI Institute, and UC Observatories.
Astronomical League National Young Astronomer Award (NYAA)
A national award from the Astronomical League that recognizes outstanding original astronomical research by US high-school-age students, judged by a panel of professional astronomers; the first-place winner receives a telescope and an expense-paid trip to the League's national convention, ALCon.
Foothill College Independent Study in Astronomy (ASTR 70R–73R)
A student-designed independent research option within Foothill College's astronomy department that lets dual-enrolled high schoolers contract with an instructor to carry out their own astronomy research project for transferable college credit.
Exoplanet Watch (NASA)
A NASA citizen-science project in which volunteers, including complete beginners, observe exoplanet transits with their own telescope or request free archival/robotic-telescope data, analyze the resulting light curves with NASA's free EXOTIC software, and submit results to a shared scientific database.
Galaxy Zoo (Zooniverse)
A Zooniverse citizen-science project, active since 2018, in which volunteers classify the shapes of distant galaxies from telescope images, including new imagery from the Vera C. Rubin Observatory, to help astronomers study how galaxies form and evolve.