Hi Chelsea,

The education required to become an astronomer is as follows: You would
start by going to college and studying science, preferably physics and/or
astronomy. The physics is most important to learn. Which school you go
to isn't extremely important. State colleges, like the University of
California system, are just as good as private universities like Harvard
or Princeton. The important thing is to learn basic physics. After you
graduate from college, you would go on to graduate school to earn a
doctorate degree. Here you want to get into the very best astronomy
program you can. The better the program, the more likely you are to get
a job in astronomy later. Some of the best astronomy programs include
the California Institute of Technology, UC Berkeley, Harvard, Princeton,
UC Santa Cruz, Univ. of Washington, Univ. of Arizona, and a few others.
As a grad student, you take classes in astronomy and work on research
projects with professors.

Once you have a PhD, you apply for what is called a Postdoctoral Research
position. This is very similar to the journeyman of the middle ages -
you go to a few different schools, working independently and trying to
establish a reputation as a good astronomer. After you've finished a
couple of postdoc positions, you can try to become a professor.

If you want to become an astronaut, the process is different. You still
need to go to college, but you don't necessarily major in physics. There
are several types of astronauts. Pilots and Commanders are usually Air
Force Acadamy graduates or Navy pilots. These are the people who actually
fly the shuttle. Mission Specialists are scientists who run experiments
on board. Some are astronomers, some are physicists, some are chemists,
some are biologists. It depends on what experimetns you are running.
Finally, there are "payload specialists", who are engineers responsible
for the launch and repair of satellites. You can learn more about
becoming an astronaut from NASA. Their webpage is:
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/shuttle/reference/factsheets/asseltrn.html

I hope this helps you on your project. Good luck!

Sincerely,

Kurtis Williams

"A man is like a fraction whose numerator is what he is and
whose denominator is what he thinks of himself. The larger the
denominator the smaller the fraction. " -- Lev Tolstoy

Back to the Ask An Astronomer page.