DEAPS

Discovering Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences is a 3-day Freshmen Pre-Orientation Program exploring Weather and Climate.

Incoming freshmen explore the challenges of weather and climate through an exciting combination of lectures, fluids experiments and social events in Cambridge and Boston. The program ends with an overnight trip to the Mt Washington Observatory in New Hampshire to explore the meteorology, geology and ecology of the area. Star gazing through portable telescopes led by EAPS astronomers are an evening highlight.

This three-day exploration covers some of the most interesting and challenging aspect of weather and climate research.

The first day of the program is dedicated to extreme weather events, such as hurricanes and winter blizzards. What do we know about their nature and their frequency? Are they getting more extreme and more frequent?

On the second day the focus shifts to current issues of climate research. What have we learned from the past climate, what do we know of the present and what can we say about the future?

Lectures by experts in the field are accompanied by rotating fluid laboratory experiments, intended to illustrate the behavior of fluids on the rotating earth. Students have the opportunity to work in small groups and get their hands wet, discussing their results with faculty, graduate students and peers.

The third and last day of the program is spent on a trip to the Mt Washington Observatory in New Hampshire. The 6288 ft mountain peak is known as the place where "extreme weather" is the norm. Here students are exposed to the challenges of observational meteorology together with a direct experience of the mountain environment and geology.

Below, enjoy a slide-show of images from the DEAPS 2011 trip up Mount Washington...

In August 2012, the program has been extended to a 5 day exploration of Weather and Climate with a 2 day trip to Mt Washington, NH - see

DEAPS (2012): DEAPS 2012: Extreme weather and Climate
DEAPS (2013): Classroom Earth - DEAPS  Extreme Weather and Climate 2013>
DEAPS (2014): Classroom Earth - DEAPS Extreme Weather and Climate 2014
DEAPS (2015): New students discover EAPS through Extreme Weather and Cimate
DEAPS (2016): Classroom Earth: DEAPS Extreme Weather and Climate 2016

For more information about the next DEAPS program contact Lodovica Illari by sending email to illari@mit.edu.

DEAPS website.

Updated Spring 2017