Astronomy Week in Madeira, Portugal Best Practices Best P. Augusto J. L. Sobrinho Keywords Universidade da Madeira and Centro de Universidade da Madeira and Centro de Public Outreach, Informal Education, Astronomia e Astrofísica da Universidade Astronomia e Astrofísica da Universidade de Exhibitions, Non-traditional Events de Lisboa, Portugal Lisboa, Portugal [email protected] [email protected] Summary The outreach programme Semanas da Astronomia (Astronomy Weeks) is held in late spring or summer on the island of Madeira, Portugal. This programme has been attracting enough interest to be mentioned in the regional press/TV/radio every year and is now, without doubt, the astronomical highlight of the year on Madeira. We believe that this programme is a good case study for showing how to attract the general public to astronomy in a small (population 250 000, area 900 km2) and fairly isolated place such as Madeira. Our Astronomy Weeks have been different each year and have so far included exhibitions, courses, talks, a forum, documentaries, observing sessions (some with blackouts), music and an astro party. These efforts may contribute towards putting Madeira on the map with respect to observational astronomy, and have also contributed to the planned installation of two observatories in the island. The relevance of the Astronomy the trails known as the Levada Walks, so Weeks for Madeira that tourism is, by far, the main industry on Madeira. As a natural consequence, The Semanas da Astronomia began in many (nature) themed Festas (festivals) 2001. The success of the programme has now take place throughout the year. For varied over the years. However the Weeks example, the Festa da Anona (Festival of have attracted enough interest to be men- the Cherimoya – a type of pawpaw), Festa tioned in the regional press/TV/radio every da Vinha e do Vinho (Wine Festival), Festa year. This could be a crucial element in im- da Castanha (Chestnut Festival), Festa proving how the public and regional au- da Flor (Flower Festival), Festa da Cereja thorities perceive the relevance of astron- (Cherry Festival). In most cases the Festas omy to attract general support for two last a whole week, albeit with an empha- observatories (optical and radio) that we sis on weekends. So, why not a Festa of plan to install on Madeira (e.g., Augusto, astronomy? 2011). In 2000 the Astronomy Group of the Universidade da Madeira1 took formal The Inception shape as we were already setting up the first ever national astronomical meeting The island of Madeira is famous for its as- in Madeira: the XI Portuguese National tounding natural beauty, and notably for Meeting of Astronomy and Astrophysics2 the World Heritage Laurissilva Forest. More (Figure 1). Since the scientific programme than a million tourists visit each year, to en- Figure 1. The poster of the XI Encontro Nacional de was to last only two days (there are not so joy the spectacular scenery that the island Astronomia e Astrofísica showing part of the south many astronomers in Portugal; although has to offer, and especially that found on coast of Madeira. the vast majority of them did come to this 24 CAPjournal, No. 12, May 2012 CAPjournal, No. 12, May 2012 year. However, the second attempt in 2002 since, when lectures finish on Madeira, stu- would be riskier. Not only because a repeat dents and teachers tend to “disappear” for of the initial success couldn’t be guaran- the summer. We have also tried events at teed, but also because we would be lack- different times of day, to attract more work- ing our greatest attraction: a meeting of ing people (out of office hours) and univer- national relevance. So we would have to sity students: events early in the day were fill up the last two days of the week with not getting much attention, nor were we events. We had the idea of doing an all- successfully attracting the students (and night star party, hoping to make it the cli- unfortunately, this has only changed for the max and finale of the week (as it still is to- worse in recent years). day, taking place on the night of Friday into Saturday). That was our first AstroFesta Over the years from 2003 to 2008, the (AstroParty) and this event was also our AstroParty continued to be the most pop- best chance of keeping the attention of ular event. We have summarised the the press for the second year running too4 Astronomy Weeks III to VIII in Table 1. We — 15–20 July 2002. It worked fine. Since maintained the number of courses of- the AstroParty was now the main event, fered and had roughly the same number we made sure that the public would not be of speakers, but public interest in these disappointed: we set it up in the hills at a events diminished from year to year. We very dark site at an altitude of 1600 metres, kept, for the first four years, the observation but accessible by road (although a spe- model of the previous years (sunspots + Figure 2. The poster of the IX Semana da Astronomia, cial permit was required from the Regional AstroParty). A turning point came in 2006, held during the IYA2009 as an official event in that Forests Department). It was no accident when hardly anyone attended either the programme. that this was very close to the only site in AstroParty or the courses (despite choos- Madeira with published results on its splen- ing very focused themes like: “News from meeting), a Thursday and a Friday, we de- did observational quality (McInnes, 1981). Saturn (Cassini)” or “The discovery of the cided to convert the whole week into a However, that was not enough for us. We first young radio galaxy in a super-galaxy”) Festa da Astronomia (23–27 July 20013) also made sure that no moonlight would and so we decided that we should get back during which time the closed meeting disturb our observations of deep-sky ob- to the city (the terrace of the University) to would take place, with most public activ- jects; after all, we were taking our 30-cen- attract the public back again; and can- ities taking place between Monday and timetre automatic telescope up on the celled all the courses. In 2007 and 2008 Wednesday. We held three observing ses- mountain, as well as a generator! We kept we went back to night-time observations sions. One in the day, for sunspots — the the day-time session to observe sunspots, with great success (twice during the Week, Sun was particularly active that year — and but the night-time sessions were now re- in addition to the day-time observation ses- two at night, with telescopes and equip- placed by the AstroParty. We reduced the sion and the AstroParty). Since then the ment set up on the terrace of the University number of astronomy courses offered from AstroParty (the landmark of the Astronomy building, and a wide selection of nine small nine to five (five speakers, one of whom Week) has remained popular. In 2007 and astronomy courses (each 1.5 hours long), was new) with a resulting drop in public in- 2008 we offered a single, longer (six-hour) given by five different coordinators, cover- terest. course, for free, on basic astronomy. This ing all the main basic astronomical topics, course was mainly targeted towards teach- and with catchy titles: “The Sun, our star”, Finally, the presence of a visiting astron- ers, and was successful in 2007, but less “The amazing planets”, “The fascinating omer (Ivan Andronov, Odessa National so in 2008. We also radically changed the stars”, “The Milky Way, our galaxy”, “The University, Ukraine), on a three-month look of the poster in 2007; and we cele- majestic normal galaxies”, “Black holes”, professorship at Madeira, motivated us to brated the inauguration of the Laboratory “Fantastic active galaxies”, “The origin of change the initial emphasis of the Week: for Astronomical Instrumentation (the high- the Universe”, “The big mysteries of as- the opening address was now given by the light that year). In 2008 we held an exhibi- tronomy”. The open part of the week con- Rector, followed by a public talk (mid-week) tion and officially presented the first con- cluded with a public talk entitled, “Is there given by our guest (on cataclysmic stars). firmed 100+ events for the International alien life?”, which proved particularly at- Our hope was to have a repeat event with Year of Astronomy (IYA2009) on Madeira tractive (an almost full auditorium). Finally, an international speaker every year but, un- (in the end we passed the 200-event we started a tradition that lasted several fortunately, this has not been possible. mark6). years, with the characteristic look of our Astronomy Week posters. In 2005, the International Year of Physics, An established event we devoted a week-long exhibition7 to Einstein and his many contributions to The natural consequence Each year we have experimented with new astrophysics. That was another turning events, to keep the interest of the public point for our Astronomy Week, and we held Having had success with our first attempt (and the press). We tried changing the date exhibitions every year until 2009 ( although at an Astronomy Week, the natural reac- to early June, so that schools were still in we hope to resume these in 2011: see tion was to try to repeat it in the following session (for both students and teachers) more below). The start of the exhibitions Astronomy Week in Madeira, Portugal 25 Astronomy Week in Madeira, Portugal out of the eleven activities of the Week took closed (and now still exists only through place in Porto Moniz, in the northern part the work of volunteers like us) and there of the island.