Newton Lacy Pierce Prize Lecture

233rd AAS Meeting, January 2019

In January 2019, I had the privilege of accepting the 2018 Newton Lacy Pierce Prize from the American Astronomical Society for outstanding early career achievements in observational astronomy. In conjunction, I gave a plenary lecture to ~1000 attendees of the AAS meeting. While the primary focus of this lecture was on my research on The Obscured Early Universe, I took some text on each of my slides to speak truth to my negative experiences as a woman in astronomy, and how these experiences act as a constant distraction to the challenge of making broad scientific impact. It is worth pointing out that I hold many privileges that certain types of negative experiences invisible to me, especially racist, ableist, or homophobic actions. The incidents I shared are my own, but it's only the tip of the iceberg. I have true admiration for all who fight for equity in STEM from more marginalized positions.

A recording of my plenary lecture is available here in two forms (FB live stream and AAS Recording):


AAS Recording Coming Soon.

Afterward I was overwhelmed by the outpouring of support from the broader community. Below are a collection of tweets.