Students in the ASP Media and Society course gain hands-on experience in reporting, interviewing, and audio production — and an understanding of why media matters.
July 29, 2026
ASP Astronomy helps students develop an appreciation for the universe — and their place in it.
BY JANA F. BROWN
In week two of the St. Paul’s School Advanced Studies Program, Leslie Chamberlain, PhD, teaches students in her Astronomy class about the compositions, evolutions, and luminosities of stars.
“We learn that luminosity…is found practically everywhere,” says Cassian Burke, a junior at Windham High School. “We did some quick math with partners to try to figure out the average luminosity of a human and…we learned that humans do in fact shine. That helped me understand how astronomically brighter stars are, and also, thanks to my amazing instructor, that ‘no matter what anyone says, you always shine.’”
Those are precisely the connections Chamberlain hopes her students make as they contemplate their place in the universe by studying stars, planets, galaxies, and more. The course is among the most popular each summer, something Chamberlain attributes to its status as a “gateway science.” Astronomy, she explains, can range from technical physics to simply enjoying images and pondering the universe. The program benefits from access to the School’s Walter and Lenore Hawley Observatory and its high quality reflecting telescopes, which allow students to progress as their skills grow.
Chamberlain reveals that students’ initial gaze through the scopes is often underwhelming. They’ve already seen superior pictures from the largest instrument in space, the James Webb Space Telescope, so when they finally look through their own eyepiece, they see what looks like a smudge.
“The first reaction is, ‘What’s that?’” says Chamberlain, an astrophysicist and former member of the science faculty at St. Paul’s School (2010-15) who returned in 2016 to teach at ASP. “But once they find objects on their own, they start to see differences. The more they look at them, the more they understand that looking at a cluster of stars is looking at thousands of stars. Curiosity comes, and they start having that awe-inspiring reaction.”
Chamberlain’s own curiosity about the universe developed when she was a child, but it wasn’t until college that studying physics helped her realize that astronomy was a legitimate scientific discipline. At ASP, Chamberlain introduces her students to the basics of astronomy with a goal of leading them to independent discoveries. The program begins with learning constellations and telling cultural sky stories, helping students recognize the interconnectedness of the night sky. Coursework then moves into stellar evolution, dark matter, and life in the universe. Projects include individual galaxy research and mock Webb Telescope proposals to search for biosignatures on exoplanets.
Chamberlain’s students set up a telescope at the Hawley Observatory.
A view of the night sky from inside the observatory.
Hopkinton High School senior Jillian Dunlap recalls that on the first day of class, students were assigned a spherical object, ranging from a marble to a basketball. They were then asked to find another person in the room whose object’s size relative to theirs equaled the roughly 4:1 ratio of the Earth and moon and then stand the proportional distance between the two objects.
“We all stood too close to each other,” Dunlap says. “It’s been a theme in our class that we need to remind each other that the vast majority of space is empty. This idea is one that makes personal problems feel insignificant when considering our place in space-time.”
By the end of the summer, Chamberlain’s students can identify star clusters by their location in the sky and put them into galactical context. They also begin to understand stellar development, become adept at distinguishing between spiral (flat) and elliptical (three-dimensional) galaxies, and learn to differentiate old red giant stars from hot blue stars. Sometimes they catch passing glimpses of satellites or the International Space Station.
“You can feel the bubbling of excitement at the observatory during those moments,” Chamberlain says.
Among the coolest perks of the Astronomy course are the bi-weekly nighttime observation sessions, which offer an authentic astronomer experience. As their peers are returning to the dorm for homework, Astronomy students are venturing outside to observe the stars. Chamberlain hopes her students’ experience will lead to a working knowledge of astronomical language, plus a lasting sense of curiosity, confidence in tackling hard problems, and a lifelong appreciation of the universe.
“I hope they understand the connection they can have with the sky and that people forever have had with the sky,” Chamberlain says. “The world will always be a little bit more beautiful because they know a little bit more.”
