DSPIRA 2019
Four of the six teachers had done this before. This summer went to writing down what three years had taught them.
6 teachers from 6 states, 4 returning. Six weeks in Morgantown and Green Bank.
The 2019 cohort
Six teachers participated, and four returned for a second or third summer. This was the most experienced of the three documented in-person cohorts.
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John Makous returning NC
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Howard Chun returning RI
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Tad Herman returning NY
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John Clarke returning FL
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Robert Baker CA
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Michael Stover WV
A different kind of summer
The 2019 program followed an established structure. Teachers spent four weeks in Morgantown building a horn, low-noise amplifier, and software spectrometer. They then observed for two weeks at Green Bank Observatory.
What was different was who turned up. Four of the six teachers had participated before, including two attending for the third time. The summer could build on their existing knowledge. Returning teachers could already write GNU Radio blocks. During the intervening school years, they had run these projects with their students.
So the emphasis moved. They spent less time making the instruments work. Instead, they organized three years of labs, lectures, and activities for teachers new to the program.
Written by the teachers
The clearest output of the third in-person summer was a site the teachers curated themselves. Classroom Radio Astronomy collected lessons and exercises written by participating teachers. These authors had developed and tested the material with students.
That site was archived in 2026. Retained teacher materials are available on the main lessons site. The teachers' AP Physics velocity-curve unit is there in full.
Where it lives now
The velocity curve unit
The 2019 cohort's own material, migrated into the lessons site and still maintained.
What came next
2019 was the last of the three in-person cohorts documented on this site. NSF Award 1611114 continued through 2021. Beginning in summer 2020, participants shifted their effort into the public lessons site and remote collaboration.
Teachers kept building after the original award ended, updating lesson material in 2025 while community contributors helped telescope users. A follow-on workshop brought DSPIRA to another group of educators. The collection now includes 50 free lessons across 7 modules.
The program published its conference paper in 2019. Two of its four authors, John Makous and Howard Chun, were cohort teachers.
The 50 DSPIRA lessons cover the astronomy, hardware, signal processing and labs from these summers. They are free and maintained by the DSPIRA community.