Interview with Henry Slomba
[go to Interview Transcription]
In our seventh episode of the Voices of Local Leaders series, we interview Henry Slomba, a local high school student, artist and amateur astronomer. As highlighted by every science educator in this interview series (here, here, here, and here) [as well as by our favorite Bird and Moon comics, by Rosemary Mosco], the use of art is a really powerful approach to engage people into science, particularly youth. And Henry is a great example of that. Fascinated by science fiction and fantasy, he discovered the marvels of the cosmos during middle school. As his interest in Astronomy grew, Henry started exploring the night sky through his telescope lenses around his neighborhood, an open invitation to the curiosity of people walking down the street or just passing by. Even though everyone admires the stars and the Moon, Henry finds it really rewarding to see the excitement on people’s faces when they are able to see details of the lunar surface or even other planets for the first time in their lives. We really praise Henry for his enthusiasm in sharing his Astronomy knowledge with his neighbors and sparking their curiosity about the cosmos!
Interview Transcription
“I’m Henry Slomba, I’m a junior at West Haven High School and the Educational Center for the Arts in New Haven. I’ve always lived here; I was born in New Haven. I’ve been really interested in Astronomy for a few years. I practice amateur Astronomy, I have a telescope, and that’s something that I’ve been involved with in my education and my interests.
[Science Yourself] How were you first introduced to Astronomy?
[Henry Slomba] It was in 8th grade science class, in middle school. We did a small unit on Astronomy and the Solar system. That was something that I’d never been exposed to in that way, and there was something there that really interested me. I wanted to know more about it. It was that sort of first exposure through school that got me involved a little bit and just, on my own, I brought in that interest. I got a telescope to use, got outside, looked at the stars and the planets, and learned about that sort of things. Throughout all my life I’ve been really interested in science fiction and that sort of genre. I study art in school, and I’m an artist. Science fiction, in film and comics and just that sort of cultural media, is something that I’ve absorbed all my life. When I got exposed to space and Astronomy in that class, it made me realize that these kinds of things, that I’ve seen in fantasy and fiction, they really exist in the sky and are out there in the world. So, I think it was my interest in science fiction that really got me interested in actual science and Astronomy in that way.
“Being able to live through actually knowing that real explorers have gone to these brand-new places that we’d never have gone to before, that’s something very interesting to follow to”
[Science Yourself] How do you feel about the recent successful land of PERSEVERANCE on Mars?
[Henry Slomba] I’m really interested in all the NASA missions. Just knowing that it’s a really current thing that’s happening, and people are researching all of this with the space launches and trying to go farther and go into space more and have a presence there. It’s something that’s alive and being constantly investigated through these missions. The PERSEVERANCE on Mars, I’ve been waiting for this since they started building it like a year ago. It's really exciting all the new tests that they are doing. It takes a long time too. They are talking about, maybe in 2030’s they can send another one to get the samples from the rover.
Moon during the total lunar eclipse in 2019 seen through Henry's telescopeI’ll still be watching then, I think. I’m waiting for these Artemis mission machines, back to the Moon and eventually to Mars. I think we have all the robotic probes and everything. Being able to live through actually knowing that real explorers have gone to these brand-new places that we’d never have gone to before. We have the space station and all these manned missions there, that’s something very interesting to follow to. You can actually see the space station going by in the sky sometimes. And that’s something I really enjoy: just having that evidence that this piece of spacecraft, that a long time ago nobody would ever thought that we could really do it. Getting to Mars with a manned mission would be something that I would really anticipate very quickly, and back to the Moon.
[Science Yourself] Can you tell us about the amateur Astronomy on the sidewalks that you’ve been doing around your neighborhood?
[Henry Slomba] It’s really not something that I set out to organize, go out and make happen. But it’s something that, when I’m doing Astronomy and looking at thing in my telescope, I go down to the sidewalk on the busiest street near my house, because that’s where we can see the best stars and everything. And sometimes, you know, people walking by on the sidewalk (or sometimes stopping their cars) just to see there’s a guy with a telescope, and see maybe what they can see through that. It’s really fun to be able to show people what I’m doing and share that with them. A lot of people seem really interested about what is out there. It seems that there is this sort of interest in science and Astronomy that everybody sort of has, even if they haven’t really tapped into it so much. But just seeing the science out there, I think it’s something that anybody can appreciate and that’s something very nice for me to see and be able to share.
[Science Yourself] How is the interaction with people that stop by and start a conversation about the telescope?
[Henry Slomba] Most of the time, when I show somebody something through the telescope, they tell me that they’ve never seen that in their lives and that’s so cool that they’ve finally been able to actually see what’s up there through an instrument. I guess that’s what I think about when I talk about the interest that anybody can have, even if they’ve never looked up so much or thought about what’s up there. It seems like people are really very interested when they get this exposure to this thing that is sort of new to them, but something that anybody can know about it and relate to it. Everybody learns the planets in elementary school. So, it’s just tapping into this basic knowledge that everybody has, but really seeing it for the first time is really exciting, I think. A lot of people really like to see the rings around Saturn. They always remark: “Wow, you can actually see them! They’re actually there!” That’s really fun to be able to expose people to. The Moon is another big one, which is much bigger and much larger than any other object that you can really see through the telescope. People are just looking at it and can see all the craters. It’s like you are in the Apollo capsule and you can actually see what they saw when they were going to the Moon, but just from the sidewalk.
“Seeing the science out there, I think it’s something that anybody can appreciate and that’s something very nice for me to see and be able to share”
[Science Yourself] What is a common myth or misconception about the cosmos that you have heard during your sidewalk Astronomy interactions?
[Henry Slomba] I think Astronomy, with the fact that there are events that happen with the planets, a lot of them get super hyped up in the media. Sometimes it gets sort of exaggerated about what you can actually see.
When the news say: ‘There is going to be a Super Moon tonight.’ A Super Moon is really no different from any other regular Moon. But one misconception that a lot of people have talked to me about is surrounding the North Star, Polaris, which is the star that is always in the North (because it’s right above the North Pole). A common misconception about that is that [Polaris] is the brightest star. It’s actually a pretty dim star. One time I was talking to a guy who pointed out at Mars, which was the brightest thing in the sky that night, and he was like ‘Man, that must be Polaris, the North Star, coz it’s the brightest thing.’ When I told him it was Mars, he was actually a lot more interested in it, because he was ‘Wow, that’s actually a planet not this little old star that I thought it was!’
Henry observing the Moon and the Sun during the day through a powerful filter“I think that goes back to what science is about: the unknown and learning what we don’t know already”
[Science Yourself] What would be your suggestion to other students, maybe younger than you, that are interested in science, fascinated by some particular aspects of it, and want to learn and explore more of it?
[Henry Slomba] When I was first interested in Astronomy, it was almost daunting getting involved in this sort of big thing. I probably believed some of those myths about the North Star and everything. When I got my telescope and became somebody who was really interested in this sort of thing, there was this idea that I had to know a lot about it to be interested in it. I would try to memorize the planets, check myself and get it wrong. It felt silly I could call myself somebody who was interested in this thing, but I didn’t really know so much about it. I think that goes back to what science is about: the unknown and learning what we don’t know already. I think there’s really no shame in first getting involved in science and not really knowing everything about what you’re interested in. Because, I mean, that’s the point: to learn and to be able to know those things bit by bit and get interested. I think that knowing that and knowing that you don’t need all the tools and all the capabilities before you can get interested in science. For a while, I was just doing Astronomy with my eyes, what I could see out in the backyard, before I even got the telescope. I was interested in looking around, what I could see, and doing the same sort of learning that I do with the telescope before I had it. So, eventually I knew enough about the sky that I would be able to point the telescope and know where to look. The telescope augmented my interested, furthered it, instead of becoming what I could do Astronomy through. The telescope helped me learn and have that interest, but it didn’t make my interest possible. If you get led to get certain tools or instruments and further your interest and your knowledge, that’s really great. But you don’t need any pre-requisites or any knowledge or tools or anything before you can be somebody who’s interested in science or any field of learning.
