2008 Woodie Awards
Meet Katy Haugland '09: Vice president of The Sidewalk Astronomers
By: Charlie White
Issue date: 3/24/06 Section: Features
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Be it knitting, fixing cars, or drinking heavily and watching reruns of Dallas, we all have our hobbies. Katy Haugland '09 happens to spend her free time building telescopes and spreading the joy of stars and sunspots to schools, libraries, and sketchy street corners in Los Angeles.
Haugland, who grew up and continues to live in Los Angeles when she isn't at Macalester, had her first astronomical experience in the second grade when her teacher made the mistake of informing her class that Mercury was a smaller planet than Pluto. Befuddled, Haugland's little mind decided to research the truth, and of course ended up proving her teacher wrong. This triumph was just the beginning of her interest in astronomy.
“When I was in sixth grade, my mother was working in environmental education,” said Haugland. “She introduced me to John Dobson, the founder of the club that I am currently the vice president of.”
The club is the Sidewalk Astronomers, a group based in California whose ideas are based on sharing the knowledge of astronomy with anybody who will listen. Not only do they share their telescopes with students and library or national park patrons, but they even go so far as to set up their telescopes on random street corners in Los Angeles. “I've actually almost been shot twice doing that,” she said.
Most of Haugland's inspiration for her astronomy came from John Dobson, she said. “He basically just told me that I was going to do this,” she said. “He was like, you're going to build some telescopes, and you're going to do public service with them.”
Although she is currently the vice president of the Sidewalk Astronomers, she claims that it doesn't really mean very much. “Nobody really ever does anything. We don't even have meetings… part of the reason we don't have many members is because everyone seems to be all about meeting and talking about stuff,” she said. “And the problem with that is we don't really like each other that much, so talking doesn't usually get us anywhere.”
Haugland, who grew up and continues to live in Los Angeles when she isn't at Macalester, had her first astronomical experience in the second grade when her teacher made the mistake of informing her class that Mercury was a smaller planet than Pluto. Befuddled, Haugland's little mind decided to research the truth, and of course ended up proving her teacher wrong. This triumph was just the beginning of her interest in astronomy.
“When I was in sixth grade, my mother was working in environmental education,” said Haugland. “She introduced me to John Dobson, the founder of the club that I am currently the vice president of.”
The club is the Sidewalk Astronomers, a group based in California whose ideas are based on sharing the knowledge of astronomy with anybody who will listen. Not only do they share their telescopes with students and library or national park patrons, but they even go so far as to set up their telescopes on random street corners in Los Angeles. “I've actually almost been shot twice doing that,” she said.
Most of Haugland's inspiration for her astronomy came from John Dobson, she said. “He basically just told me that I was going to do this,” she said. “He was like, you're going to build some telescopes, and you're going to do public service with them.”
Although she is currently the vice president of the Sidewalk Astronomers, she claims that it doesn't really mean very much. “Nobody really ever does anything. We don't even have meetings… part of the reason we don't have many members is because everyone seems to be all about meeting and talking about stuff,” she said. “And the problem with that is we don't really like each other that much, so talking doesn't usually get us anywhere.”
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