Nutsinee Kijbunchoo

Nutsinee Kijbunchoo

Graduate student representative

Election statement

First of all, thank you for the nomination and for giving me the opportunity to have a real adult responsibility. My name is Nutsinee Kijbunchoo. I’m a first year graduate student at the Australian National University. My days with the LSC started back in 2014 as an undergraduate student at Louisiana State University. I started off doing data analysis for the Detector Characterization group and was able to see the collaboration with a fresh pair of young eyes. I saw not just a bunch of scientists but a big happy family. I later joined LIGO Hanford as an operations specialist. At Hanford I was able to see the collaboration from a whole new perspective. I saw how all the working groups from around the world joint force to get LIGO going. After 2.5 years at Hanford I’m now looking at the collaboration as a student again, from the other side of the world, knowing what I want to achieve.

This collaboration has given me so much. It’s about time I return the favor. If elected as a LAAC grad student representative, I will utilize my experience in any way I can, within my power, to make other people’s lives as part of the collaboration, especially young students’ lives, easier. I want to make The information that I wish I had more accessible, such as which group is doing what and where, who’s a point of contact for what (science) issues. The warm and friendly welcome to the collaboration I received years ago, I want to spread that and keep it going. I want to set up a channel for students to talk about their mental health issues (depressed? you are not alone) and/or support each other through the thesis writing stage. I will be keeping my eyes and ears open for recommendations on things that could be done to make us all happier.