“Hey everyone, come and see how good I look!” says the nearest and brightest Type Ia supernova discovered in the last thirty-plus years, quoting the venerable Ron Burgundy.

Okay, not really. But all earthly observers with a small telescope (or even binoculars) can see just how good this recent cosmic explosion looks, as Lawrence Berkeley Lab scientist Peter Nugent describes in his sensational YouTube debut.

Tomorrow night (Saturday, September 10 starting after dusk), you can visit the Chabot Space and Science Center in Oakland to hear Nugent discuss the supernova in person while viewing it through their 36 inch reflector telescope.

This exceptional celestial explosion, known as SN 2011fe or PTF11kly, was discovered on August 24th, 2011 by the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF), a collaborative astronomical survey relying on the work of astronomers around the globe, including many at UC Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBL). UC Berkeley researcher Jeffrey Silverman highlights the rapid and collaborative nature of this discovery, explaining, “This thing was first observed in Palomar, identified as a supernova at LBL, given a supernova type in the Canary Islands, and confirmed in Hawaii and San Jose just hours later. With this big international collaboration, we can monitor its brightness hourly around the world, starting from basically the time of explosion.”

Every Coalition student I’ve met has at least one endearing story about Hugo Ramirez, and each staffer has at least one great idea from the mind of Steve Chin. Just as mathematics is a crucial component of all the science and engineering fields, this Mathematical Duo plays a central role in the Coalition.

Steve and Hugo represent the Mathematics Department’s Professional Development Program (PDP), one of the oldest Coalition programs. The team of PDP staffers, which also includes Tansel Pope, Diana Lizarraga, and Chris Noble, manage a suite of programs that support students from early high school through graduation from Cal. They work with high school math teachers, bring a group of high schoolers from around the country to Berkeley for a residential summer engineering institute, run intensive math sections for incoming freshman, and provide undergraduate research opportunities for students approaching graduation (a program appropriately titled NERDS). That PDP’s reach extends beyond Cal’s student population is a credit to the aptitude and enthusiasm of its staff, who are quick to embrace any opportunity to extend their support network.

PDP was founded in 1974 with one lofty goal in its founder’s mind: “Professor Leon Henkin wanted to support students coming from the most marginalized and underprivileged groups, to help them become PhDs, professors, and Nobel laureates,” says Steve. Situated at the hub of science and engineering fields, their program has seen nearly every Coalition student over the past 37 years pass through its doors. While PDP has been through many changes and challenges in the decades since its founding, the goal remains the same; as associate director and PDP alumnus, Hugo Ramirez, says, “We are still motivated by the idea, ‘Let’s get some Nobel laureates,’ some very powerful influential people who can make systemic changes in our society and our academic environment.” With Steve and Hugo at the helm, this project is in very capable hands

The Coalition for Excellence and Diversity in Mathematics, Science and Engineering is the “Justice League” of programs on campus confronting the problems of underrepresentation in math, science and engineering. The following post is one in a series, kicked off by this introduction, highlighting the work of each of the Coalites and the programs they represent.

The SAGE, Marjorie Weingrow, spends more time at other corporations’ headquarters than her own office. Directing the several hundred thousand dollar Student Achievement Guided by Experience (SAGE) Scholars program without a dime of support from its founding university requires that she spend most of her time fundraising—something she wasn’t hired for or trained to do.

Marjorie has nonetheless led SAGE in graduating 100% of its low-income, first-generation college students over its eleven years in existence. And all have gone on to career jobs or graduate schools upon graduation. The program has achieved great success through expert-led workshops and classes in career-development, alongside myriad internship opportunities and personalized career advising and coaching. In fact, the SAGE Scholars are so successful in their internships that Marjorie has a hard time sharing the program’s wealth of opportunities with other students not in the program. “They want SAGE Scholars,” she says. “Companies ask for them by name.”

The perfect woman for the job

Armed with Montessori-teacher and executive- and life-coach training, Marjorie Weingrow has worked for a list of companies and organizations far too long to reproduce here, but it includes the likes of the American Cancer Society and the Alameda County Office of Education. The driving force behind what might seem like a random-walk of careers is the service of low-income students—those who lack the opportunities so many take for granted. She says, “I’m driven to answer the question: how can we introduce these students to careers they don’t ordinarily think about? How can we broaden their scope?”

The battle is a personal one for Marjorie. “I came from a very low income background,” she says. “My family did not encourage me to get an education. They said, ‘Oh, well you’re a girl; you’ll just get married,’ which only made me determined to succeed in something other than child-rearing. So I can relate to a lot of what many of the SAGE scholars and other low-income students go through.”