ESSIC Director, Professor Antonio Busalacchi, welcomed "weather campers" from Howard University's NOAA Center for Atmospheric Sciences' (NCAS) to the center this week.
The NCAS camp offers rising high school juniors and seniors first hand exposure to educational and career opportunities in atmospheric sciences.
NOAA's Dr. Scott Rudlosky, an ESSIC visiting assistant scientist, collaborated with NOAA's outreach office to bring the campers to ESSIC for the first time in the program's history.
Busalacchi began his introduction to the group by describing his role at ESSIC and what the campers could gain from their experience throughout the summer.
"I hope you get inspired work hard in your academic careers, because you will find that our colleagues in NOAA across the street and here at the university are sorely in need of your talent," Busalacchi said.
Busalacchi encouraged the campers to acknowledge the real-world implications that are associated with the weather and climate fields. "As we saw last year with super storm Sandy, what happens across the street really has important relevance in offering the nation protection of life and property."
To provide the students with more insight into what a career in meteorology would be like, NCAS local host sponsor Rudlosky, presented some of his own research and participated in a question and answer session.
"I think it went really well," Rudlosky said. "The question and answer session was great at the end. It also gave our student interns the chance to present their own research, which is always good."
AOSC graduate student Dustin Shea, who supports Rudlosky's DCLMA lightning research said, "The big thing is giving them an idea of what the possibilities are for research and their future careers."
ESSIC / AOSC Professor, Xin-Zhong Liang, concluded the event with a presentation on his current projects at ESSIC.
