About twice a week a guest makes a presentation not directly related to the curriculum, followed by a reception, giving the students additional time for informal questions and open-ended discussions. Most guest speakers are prominent professors, researchers, or business leaders; some are also SSP alumni.

SSP's Guest Lecture series is underwritten by a grant from Lockheed Martin / Sandia National Laboratory.

Guest speakers at SSP 2012 include:

SSP at Westmont College, CA Dr. Margarita Marinova Planetary Scientist, NASA Ames Research Center/BAER Institute "From Antarctica to Mars: Measuring and Modeling Ground Ice" Dr. Larry Sverdrup Senior Scientist, Trex Enterprises Corporation "Mad? Science!" Dr. Susan Jerian '79 President, OncoRD, Inc. “Fighting the War on Cancer One Medicine at a Time” Dr. Steve Kilston Astronomer, Interstellar Consultants "The Ultimate Project: A Plausible Path to the Stars" Dr. Chad Higdon-Topaz Assoc. Prof. of Mathematics, Macalester College "Biological Swarms and their Mathematical Models" Dr. Omer Blaes Prof. of Physics, UC Santa Barbara "Astrophysics of Black Holes" Dr. Wayne Iba Prof. of Computer Science, Westmont College "Information and Computation: A Theory of Everything" Dr. Sigrid Close Prof. of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Stanford "Meteoroids and Asteroids: Micro to Macro Impactors"		Dr. 'Mad Scientist' Sverdrup hammers with a banana, frozen using liquid nitrogen.   Dr. Paul Butler SSP '77 describes planets outside of our solar system.
SSP at New Mexico Tech
Mika McKinnon '00 Astrophysics Consultant, SyFy Network "Disaster Science Fiction" Dr. Larry Sverdrup Senior Scientist, Trex Enterprises Corporation "Mad? Science!" Dr. Penelope Boston Director, Cave and Karst Studies, New Mexico Tech "Caves: Exploring Life Underground from Earth to Mars and Beyond" Dr. Eileen V. Ryan Director, 2.4-meter Telescope, Magdalena Ridge Observatory "Follow up and Characterization of Potentially Hazardous Asteroids using the MRO 2.4m Telescope"		Dr. Jerilyn Timlin Principal Member of Technical Staff, Sandia National Laboratories “Unlocking the Secrets of Plaque Through Optical Superresolution" Dr. Nicholas Suntzeff Prof. of Astronomy, Texas A&M University "Dark Energy and the Evolution of the Universe" Dr. Patricia Henning Prof. of Physics & Astronomy, Univ. of New Mexico "Mapping the Hidden Universe" Dr. Michael Dubson '73 Sr. Instructor, Assoc. Chair, Univ. of Colorado at Boulder "Physics vs. Lawyers: An Airline Crash Investigation"