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The International Youth Astronomy Camp is a summer camp for serious stargazers.

Posted on by Dsen .N

It seemed that the clouds plotting against Jimo Pereira last summer. The Buenos Aires university student spent most of her time curled up in a sleeping bag at the Eichsfelder Hütte, a shelter deep in Germany’s rugged Harz Mountains. Night after chilly night, she and her project partner would go out into the open fields, trying to keep warm. Every now and then, one of them would get up to check their telescope, but the clouds stubbornly blocked their view. Then, one night, they saw the stars.

For hours, the pair took turns checking the telescope and camera every 20 minutes of that cloudless night. They didn’t get an Instagram-worthy time-lapse, but they did get data on two distant stars orbiting each other in a so-called eclipsing binary. But neither were scientists. At least not professionally—not yet. They were participants in one of the most unusual summer camps in the world: one devoted to studying space in constant motion overhead, while the camp itself travels around the globe.

The traveling camp is the International Youth Astronomy Camp, an annual three-week program for 16- to 24-year-old astronomy enthusiasts that takes place in a different location each year. It has been held every summer (and occasionally in the winter) since 1969 and has been held in 15 different countries. In August, Pereira will join more than 60 other campers and 10 volunteers from more than 20 countries for his third camp, this time among the Vogtland rocks in eastern Germany, near the Czech border.

In 2023, IAYC participants traveled to Germany’s Harz Mountains to learn how to use various instruments, such as this solar telescope. Courtesy of © IAYC

On a typical morning, the camp is eerily quiet—no one moves until the campers go to breakfast at noon. From afternoon to midnight, they can participate in a variety of activities: arts and crafts, sports, team building, cultural exchange programs, and, of course, astronomy. Lunch is at 5:30 p.m., dinner at midnight, and the early morning hours are reserved for the camp’s celebrity corporate events.

On those nights, under hopefully clear skies, everyone grabs their sleeping bags and gear and heads out. The veterans teach the newbies how to operate the telescopes provided by the camp, and everyone spends the night observing. “Seeing them find something or see something new for the first time… like they’ve never seen Saturn before—it’s really exciting,” says Carys Herbert. Herbert is the president of the International Workshop for Astronomy, the parent organization of the IAYC, a PhD student in astronomy at the University of Kent and a former IAYC camper.

For decades, young astronomers have found their way to IAYC through sometimes surprising means. For example, Christoph Münkel saw an ad in a German astronomy magazine in 1974. Münkel, a latecomer, first attended camp when he was 21. The experience was the beginning of a 16-year run—he returned to IAYC year after year, first as a camper, then as a leader. Back then, the camp equipment wasn’t all that different from that used in cutting-edge astronomy research—and if you had a decent telescope, and the campers did, there was the possibility of making a real scientific discovery. The prospect created excitement and anticipation among the campers, who peered into their telescopes, hoping to see something never before seen.

Participants at the 1982 IAYC camp in Germany’s Black Forest reenact the apocryphal story of the apple, Isaac Newton, and his revelation about gravity. Courtesy of © Christoph Münkel

Münkel, now 71 and retired in Hamburg, feels extremely fortunate to have been able to participate in this event, even a few years ago when the IAYC was held outside Europe, including in Tunisia and Egypt.

The camp’s trips to Egypt were made possible by another participant who, like Münkel and many others, became a regular participant. In the early 1980s, when some friends told him they were going to Germany for the summer and encouraged him to visit, 19-year-old Khaled Shammaa, living in Egypt, didn’t know what to expect. He went to the small village of Violau, nestled in the grassy hills of southern Germany, and found the IAYC. “I wasn’t even interested in astronomy,” Shammaa says. But he was fascinated by the sight of so many people from different backgrounds who shared a passion for the stars. He decided to bring the camp to his homeland.

Shammaa served as a point of contact who organized two camps in Egypt a few years later. A year later, the campers came from Sharm el-Sheikh on the Sinai Peninsula into the heart of the desert. “We were surrounded by desert 360 degrees … and oh my God, the sky was unbelievable,” Shammaa says. Even now, at 63, he vividly remembers the majesty of the moment, and how, lying on the sand, he didn’t even need a telescope to see the meteors overhead. “Everything looked like it had been done just for us,” he says. “It was magical.”

The 1984 IAYC camp in Sharm El-Sheikh was organized by Khaled Shamma, who had become interested in astronomy several years earlier when he came to Germany to participate in the organization’s annual event. Courtesy of © IAYC

The two camps Shammaa helped organize were the beginning of IAYC’s forays outside of Europe. But the camp still lives up to its word “international,” bringing together budding astronomers from all over the world. During IAYC’s “national nights,” campers gather to give presentations or lead activities related to their country, from Scottish highland dancing to intimate stories about growing up in Afghanistan. These nights can be powerful and sometimes move campers to tears.

With only about 64 spots for camp each year, IAYC limits the number of returning campers to about 30 and works to make the cohorts as diverse as possible. Organizers first select campers based on anonymized cover letters from applicants, then make final decisions based on nationality, age, and gender to ensure balanced representation. This year, only about a third of the 180 campers who volunteered secured a spot.

“It gets harder every year,” says Herbert, who is particularly concerned about the underrepresentation of African countries (with the exception of South Africa) at the IAYC.

Cost can be a significant factor in participation; while there are grants available to cover camp costs for participants who need financial assistance, IAYC is unable to cover travel costs. This year, Herbert recalls, one candidate from Botswana submitted an amazing application, and organizers were thrilled to welcome him. However, the candidate couldn’t afford to travel to camp on his own.

In August, campers from over 20 countries will travel to eastern Germany where they will take part in an IAYC program promoting cultural exchange programs throughout their three-week stay. Courtesy of © IAYC

Successful applicants who can’t pay for travel miss out on more than three weeks of summer camp fun—IAYC is also a place where campers can network and see their potential futures. For example, camper Pereira’s home country of Argentina has very few astronomy programs, and IAYC gave her access to real astronomy graduate students who showed her what her path could look like. That encouraged her to pursue interests that might have otherwise seemed out of reach.

In fact, while most of the camp is focused on stars millions of light-years away, it turns out that the close and lasting human connections may be the most important part of the IAYC experience. Herbert, Pereira and Shammaa talk about the deep friendships they formed during their time at IAYC. As for Münkel, in 1982 he met a camper named Jasmina, who later became a professional astronomer. They chatted here and there for a few years, growing closer. This year, they will celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary.