Thanks, OAS!

[Canadian Roger]

Every now and then I get a chance to visit another astronomical group other than my own (the Hamilton group of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada).  It's a great way to see how others are solving (or not) the problems most such groups face. 

I've visited clubs in Canada and in the US, as well as dropping by BEECHE in August, 2015.  What fascinated me was how your organization seemed to be a lovely mixture of an active astronomy club and a social gathering.  I put a lot of this down to you using this forum, and not the email lists that we've been using for the last 20 years or so.

It took a lot of work on my part, but I convinced the powers-that-be to move to a Forum.  The obvious thing to do was to pattern our forum on a successful implementation.  I asked Rick a few questions, and he was most gracious in replying.

Our forum went live a month ago, to immediate success.  Rather than a handful of emails being exchanged every month, there were 85 topics and almost 500 posts in 4 weeks.  Most of these were by about 25 people, although I did get some Personal Messages from a couple of "lurkers", saying how much they were enjoying the conversations and learning from what others were talking about.

What was interesting however, was the difference in the chat that occurred during the break between the business portion of our monthly meeting, and the main speaker.   Previously, it had been about what people have been up to in the last month.  Last night, though, many of the conversations I heard bits of were related to topics from the Forum.

So...I just wanted to drop by here and say thanks.  Thanks to Rick for some good ideas and some pitfalls to avoid, and thanks to the OAS for running a forum that allows non-affiliated types like me to mostly lurk and occasionally participate.

Mostly, though...thanks for being a good example!

Roger Hill
Hamilton Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada

[Carole]

That's great Roger, glad it was such a success.

Carole

[Canadian Roger]

Carole...

In case you make it back to the Royal Botanical Gardens in Burlington, you might find a new addition to the place.

We've entered into a partnership with them to investigate building a new 110 seat planetarium at their main building.  They also would like our help to have one of their large tracts of land be designated as an urban "Dark Sky" preserve.

The two organizations are a fairly good match.  We're both "Royals", and they are Naturalists by day and I've heard amateur astronomers be described as "Naturalists of the Night". 

So...if you're in the area in three or four years, there'll hopefully be more than the chickadees to lure you in!

[Carole]

Sounds great.  No plans for coming back in the immediate future but you never know.

Carole