What you should know about astrophysics careers | Careers | Ordinary Involvement

What's up guys, it's your favorite astrophysics YouTuber Uman here back with another simplified astrophysics video. In today's video, I'm going to talk about a question I get a lot, what does an astrophysicist do? I'm also going to talk about career opportunities with an astrophysics degree and how enthusiasts like myself can get involved. But first, let's run that intro. So I should probably start out by saying that I myself aspire to be an astrophysicist one day. I've learned quite a bit about the field from my reading, watching documentaries, some astronomy and physics classes I've taken at school, some activities, and even a really cool job shadowing experience I had last summer where I job shadowed several professors of astrophysics in the area. So what does an astrophysicist do? Well an astrophysicist is a juggler. They simultaneously juggle several tasks including teaching, learning, researching, data analysis, programming, observing, and so much more. Let's talk about those first two tasks, teaching and learning. Most astrophysicists are professors. This is the teaching part of the field. They teach astronomy and physics to undergraduates and graduates at universities. But astrophysicists are also learners. What do I mean by that? Well throughout the year, these astrophysics professors do research to advance the understanding of their discipline. They try to discover new things about astrophysics, maybe try to make sense of dark matter or identify supernovas. This trend follows for professors of nearly all disciplines, be it math, history, economics, chemistry, engineering, whatever. Professors teach classes, but they also research to advance their discipline. This summer, I job shadowed several astrophysics professors, so I got to see what their work is like firsthand. In brief, a typical day might involve teaching one or two classes and collaborating with several colleagues and PhD grad students on their research. Now let's talk about the career opportunities and the skills. The primary career opportunities in astrophysics are being either a university professor or being a full-time researcher. You could teach and research at a college, or you could be focused solely on research at an observatory or planetarium, like the Mount Wilson Observatory or the Lick Observatory. I should add that there are a lot of observatories in Hawaii, so working at an observatory opens up the possibility of living in Hawaii, which in my opinion, is pretty cool. Now I've been saying mostly good things about astrophysics, but I need to point out one con. Astrophysics is very competitive, and oftentimes, opportunity in astrophysics can be lacking. Now why is this? Well, in my opinion, one of the main reasons is that astrophysics is a field that's dedicated towards intellectual curiosity. There's no money or profit or business-making in this field. When you learn that the universe is expanding, or the identity of dark matter, you're only gaining intellectual satisfaction, not money and profit. So if you invest in staff, research, observatories, and things in astrophysics, you're only investing in intellectual satisfaction, and it can be hard to get people to invest in intellectual satisfaction if there's no monetary return on it. I am by no means discouraging astrophysics. In fact, I want to do the exact opposite. I want to encourage it. I just want to point out that this field is unique in a sense, and that it's very competitive. But let me be clear. Don't let the competitive nature of astrophysics stop you from pursuing it. If you truly love this field, and you pursue it, then you will succeed. Now, because astrophysics can be competitive, many people in the field find themselves end up working in different disciplines. And that's completely okay. In fact, the career change is actually quite feasible with an astrophysics degree. My dad, for example, knows someone who has a PhD in physics from Yale, but is now working as a data scientist at a Fortune 500 company. One story you might have heard is that when NASA downsized, a lot of the staff there were picked up by Wall Street firms where they did quantitative analysis on stocks and the market. So there are two reasons why astrophysicists often find themselves working up in different fields. Firstly, astrophysics training equips you to do almost anything. You'll learn strong quantitative analysis skills and computer programming skills. Working in the financial sector or an engineering business will be no difficulty at all. Secondly, if you decide you're no longer interested in the field or just can't find anything good, then you have loads of backup options. You can try the financial sector, engineering firms, the military, medicine, you name it. I read a story of a UChicago astrophysics PhD who decided he wanted a career change and just landed a job as a data scientist. So that's the formal astrophysicist story. Now how do ordinary people just with an interest in this field get involved? Well there are several ways. First, start learning. Pick up some books, watch some documentaries, and trust me, you'll love those things. Secondly, you can start watching YouTube videos. Watch my YouTube videos or watch other astrophysics YouTuber videos. You can also find opportunities in your community. Look for nearby observatories or astronomy organizations for laypeople and enthusiasts. You can go to starry night observing sessions, seminars, and more. Maybe you could even learn to observe with professional telescopes. And if you live near any universities, see what their physics departments have going on. Many professors do outreach events like talks, radio shows, and community appearances. Try attending those. That's a little bit about astrophysics. If you weren't already interested in pursuing the field, well hopefully you are now. Even if you don't want to pursue astrophysics as a career, you can still find ways to get involved like learning online through books, documentaries, and even getting involved with your community. So hopefully you liked that video and I was able to answer some of your questions. If you like this video, well go ahead and show it some love with a like down below. And if you have any questions, comments, or concerns, leave them down in the comment section below. And if you're new to this channel and you like what you see, well go ahead and hit that subscribe button for me because it really helps out a lot. Later.