Meet Frances and her Passion for Astronomy

I can’t imagine my life without space!

➤ Bu yazıyı Türkçe okumak için tıklayın.

• Hi, Francesca, can you talk about yourself? What are you doing, what are your hobbies?

I am a 17-year-old British student studying A-levels. My subjects are Maths and physics, but there’s also a bit of astronomy as well. The courses are difficult, but I enjoy learning at school. For my hobbies, I do a lot of stargazing with my telescope, but I also do this with friends every month. We use my local observatory to look at a lot of things like planets, galaxies, and stars. I also run an astronomy blog, where I write about amazing areas of space. I also post-study notes for my classes, and I write about new discoveries. 

• You have an astronomy blog and you are interested in astronomy. What does astronomy mean to you?

Space is very unpredictable and crazy, but we study astronomy to predict how everything works. I am amazed at how crazy the universe is, and space is one of the most interesting subjects I have studied. I have always liked astronomy, and I don’t really know when I started to like it. However, the first time I used a telescope was when I was 10, became a big moment in my life. I can’t imagine my life without space! 

• What do you offer your peers about astronomy? A book, a documentary, a hobby or something else.

I recommend that you meet with more astronomers. The internet is a very useful resource, and I used it to find my local astronomy group. There I learned how to use a telescope with a computer, and how to operate an observatory. It is also a great way to learn because everybody talks about something new or that you may have never heard of. I learned a lot from books as well. One I’m currently reading is Astrophysics for People in a Hurry by Neil deGrasse Tyson. It talks about a lot of subjects, like dark matter and Flat Earth, so it is a good start for new astronomers. 

• What are your future plans and dreams, can you share with us?

I want to go to university in America or England and become a doctor of astrophysics. My dream job would be to work with a space agency and research more about life on other planets. There’s a lot of work on Mars and exoplanets with oxygen, and I would love to help with that. If I had better health, I would work to be an astronaut.

from Halil Bagis, Frances with permission.

👀 Read more  Sarah and Her Unending Questions