Robert Emonds - I am a student at The University of New Mexico, where I plan to finish my undergraduate degree next spring semester with a B.S. in Astrophysics. I have been working on data over the summer from the Westerbork SINGS Survey with my supervisor George Heald. I have mainly been
analyzing images of the Whirlpool Galaxy, in particular investigating its polarization largely through Faraday rotation measure synthesis. I feel very fortunate to havethis experience because it quite unique from other projects that I have worked on from before. This has allowed me to learn new physics and software with George's very helpful guidance. Besides working for ASTRON, I have been enjoying the Dutch countryside along with visiting Amsterdam and a few other cities. Having been to other summer programs I highly recommend this program to anyone who wishes to gain a unique experience in radio astronomy.

George Privon - I am from the United States and am finishing up a MS in Imaging Science. This fall I will be started a PhD at the University of Virginia. At ASTRON, I am working with Raffaella Morganti on neutral hydrogen absorption in powerful radio galaxies using both Westerbork and VLA data. The experience I'm gaining with all aspects of the data reduction and analysis will be very beneficial in the future. It is also very fun project to work on! Aside from the astronomy, I'm enjoying the bicycling available in the area as well as the weekly football matches.

Ciao, my name is Gabriele Surcis and I come from Cagliari (Italy). Last May I have graduated in Physics (curriculum Astrophysics) to the University of Cagliari and soon I will begin, somewhere in the world, a PhD in Astrophysics. During the period at JIVE institute, thanks to the support of Hayley Bignall and Cormac Reynolds, I reduced the data of 16 BL-Lacertae objects at the frequency of 1.6 GHz using the astronomical software AIPS. Every sources has been observed with MERLIN and the european EVN. Further, I reduced MERLIN+EVN data for some of these sources. Moreover, I visited towns of Drenthe, Amsterdam and the radio network in Westerbork with other summer students. I played soccer and softball with ASTRON/JIVE personnel, it has been very funny! Every afternoon I shared with Giuseppe Cimò the so-called "coffee time".
I recommend this experience to everybody because no to try is an error... there is no harm in trying!
For Italians: the language is not a problem... the food is less problematic!

Ivan Marti-Vidal - I am a PhD. student at the University of Valencia (Spain), under the supervision of Prof. Jon Marcaide. My thesis is focused on two main topics. On the one hand, the complete study of all the VLBI observations of supernova SN1993J (more than 50 observing epochs, spread over more than 10 years, taken at several frequencies, from 8.4 to 1.4 GHz). From this analysis, we have studied the position evolution of this supernova, the detailed expansion at different frequencies, the structure and evolution of the magnetic fields, etc. On the other hand, the first high-precision analysis (differential phase-delay analysis at 15GHz) that has been performed on a complete sample of radio sources, the S5 polar cap sample. This analysis, and other similar analyses at different epochs and frequencies (8.4 and 43 GHz), will allow us to study the absolute kinematics and spectral evolution of the components of the 13 quasars and BL-Lacs of this sample, checking the stationarity of the radio sources cores and the frequency shifts of their brightness peaks.
During my stay at JIVE/ASTRON, I have been working with Mike Garrett, analysing WSRT data of the 8 o'clock gravitational lens radio emission, at 1.6 and 4.9 GHz, and preparing a software for the automatic comparison of SDSS and NVSS data.

Hello! I'm Alison Crocker, a first-year PhD student from Oxford (was an undergrad recently at Dartmouth College, USA). My PhD project focuses on
star formation in early-type galaxies (ellipticals and S0s) as a mechanism for the creation of the kinematically decoupled subcomponents observed in many of these galaxies.
This summer, I have been working with Tom Oosterloo and Eva Manthey on reducing HI synthesis observations of 22 galaxies from the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope. For detected galaxies, I create total HI maps and HI velocity fields. These galaxies are part of the SAURON sample, so all have integral field optical spectroscopy which traces not only the stellar kinematics and linestrengths, but also the kinematics of the ionised gas and emission line ratios. With HI data complementing the data from the integral field spectrograph, we can investigate potential connections between the neutral gas, ionised gas and stars.

Allison Noble - I just finished my undergraduate degree at the University of Wisconsin - Madison and will be starting my PhD at McGill University in Montreal this fall. This summer, I have been working with James Anderson and Giuseppe Cimo on studying low-luminosity active galatic nuclei (LLAGNs) in the nearby universe. I am investigating the variability in flux density and the broad range of spectral indices for LLAGNs by looking at snapshot images from the Very Large Array of Seyfert galaxies at 4.8 and 8.6 GHz. My results will help to discriminate between various accretion and emission mechanisms. Apart from working for JIVE, I also spent time cycling to many of the surrounding towns and enjoyed playing bridge every Wednesday with fellow ASTRON/JIVE employees.