[ASA] Decadal Plan March update

Mon Mar 3 20:27:53 AEDT 2014

Dear colleagues,

This is the second monthly email from the National Committee for Astronomy summarising events associated with the 2016-25 Decadal Plan for Australian Astronomy.

* Town Hall meetings

February saw the first 10 town hall meetings held across 5 cities. These town hall meetings have been very well attended and generated a lot of excellent discussion.  During March another 16 town hall meetings are planned, details for which are listed below. A reminder that attendance and contribution to these meetings is open and encouraged; please contact the working group chairs if you would like to make a presentation.

WG 1.1            Galaxies and Cosmology

17th March,  9:30am-12:30pm, meeting room 1 (ground floor behind security), Australian Astronomical Observatory  (Contact: Andrew Hopkins<mailto:andrew.hopkins at aao.gov.au>, Ray Norris<mailto:raypnorris at gmail.com>, Bryan Gaensler<mailto:bryan.gaensler at sydney.edu.au>)

18th March, 2.00pm-5.00pm, Virtual Reality Theatre, Swinburne University CAS  (Contact: Chris Blake<mailto:cblake at swin.edu.au>)

19th March, 10:00am-1:00pm, Physics Annexe (building 6), room 424, University of Queensland  (Contact: Michael Drinkwater<mailto:m.drinkwater at uq.edu.au>)

20th March,  10:00am-1:00pm, ground floor seminar room, ICRAR, University of Western Australia  (Contact: Kenji Bekki<mailto:kenji.bekki at uwa.edu.au>, Simon Driver<mailto:simon.driver at icrar.org>)

21st March,  Room 121 (seminar room), Physics Building, University of Adelaide  (Contact: Lisa Kewley<mailto:lisa.j.kewley at gmail.com>)

24th March,  1.00pm-3.00pm, Physics Dept., University of Tasmania  (Contact: Ray Norris<mailto:raypnorris at gmail.com>)

26th March,  Duffield theatre, Mt Stromlo Observatory, Australian National University  (Contact: Lisa Kewley)

<http://wg12starsandplanets.wikispaces.com/>

WG 1.2<http://wg12starsandplanets.wikispaces.com/>            Stars and Planets

4th March,  10.00am-12.00pm, AuScope operations room, 4th floor,  Physics building, University of Tasmania  (Contact: Simon Ellingson<mailto:Simon.Ellingsen at utas.edu.au>)

WG 1.3            The Galaxy

17th March,  10.00am-1.00pm, Rm G29/G30, New Horizons Centre, Building 82, Monash University  (Contact: Chris Federrath<mailto:christoph.federrath at monash.edu>)

18th March,  10.00am-12.00pm, AuScope operations room, 4th floor, Physics building, University of Tasmania  (Contact: Simon Ellingson<mailto:Simon.Ellingsen at utas.edu.au>)

20th March,  2.00pm-5.00pm, ground floor seminar room, ICRAR, University of Western Australia  (Contact: Andrew Walsh<mailto:andrew.walsh at curtin.edu.au>)

WG 1.4            High Energy and Fundamental Astrophysics

19th March,  1.00pm – 4.00pm,  SIfA seminar room, 44 Rosehill St, NSW 2016, University of Sydney  (see the map at http://tinyurl.com/lmyzrf4)  (Contact: Bryan Gaensler<mailto:bryan.gaensler at sydney.edu.au>)

WG 3.2            Education, Training and Careers

6th March, 2.00pm-4.00pm, Virtual Reality Theater, Swinburne University CAS  (Contact: Virginia Kilborn<mailto:vkilborn at swin.edu.au>)

Combined meeting

WG 2.1            International Scale Facilities

WG 2.2 <https://sites.google.com/site/australiandecadalplanwg22>            Local and Institutional Scale Facilities

WG 2.3            eScience

WG 3.3            Industry

WG 3.4            Research Funding

25th March, 9.30am-3.30pm, Marsfield Lecture Theatre, CSIRO Astronomy and Space Science  (Contact: Sarah Pearce<mailto:Sarah.Pearce at csiro.au>, Kate Brooks<mailto:kate.brooks at csiro.au>, Karl Glazebrook<mailto:kglazebrook at swin.edu.au>)

26th March, 9.30am-3.30pm, Virtual Reality Theater, Swinburne University CAS  (Contact: Karl Glazebrook<mailto:kglazebrook at swin.edu.au>, Andrew Hopkins<mailto:andrew.hopkins at aao.gov.au>, Darren Croton<mailto:dcroton at astro.swin.edu.au>)

27th March,  9.30am-3.30pm, Duffield theatre, Mt Stromlo Observatory, Australian National University  (Contact: Martin Asplund<mailto:martin at mso.anu.edu.au>, Andrew Hopkins<mailto:andrew.hopkins at aao.gov.au>, Karl Glazebrook<mailto:kglazebrook at swin.edu.au>)

In addition to these March meetings, further town hall meetings are planned for locations around Australia during April. For information please visit AustralianAstronomyDecadalPlan.org<http://australianastronomydecadalplan.org/>.

* Demographics Survey

During February, we saw the launch of the Australian astronomy demographics survey. The purpose of this survey is to understand the current state of the Australian Astronomy workforce, including its diversity. An important aspect of the Decadal Plan is comparison with results of demographics surveys from past Decadal Plans, which allows our community to assess its strengths and more effectively plan for the future. The survey has seen a very strong response, and so we thank all those individuals who have taken time to complete it. However a number of members of the community are yet to complete the survey, and so the deadline has been extended by a week in order to achieve as broader representation as possible. We now request all people working in Australian Astronomy to please complete their surveys by the 8th March 2014. The individual survey can be found here:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/AustraliaAstronomyCensus-INDIV

Best regards,

Stuart

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Professor Stuart Wyithe
Australian Laureate Fellow
Chair, National Committee for Astronomy
School of Physics
University of Melbourne
Vic, Australia  3010

Phone:  +61 3 8344 5083
Fax:  +61 3 9347 4783
Email: swyithe at unimelb.edu.au<https://evserver2.unimelb.edu.au/EnterpriseVault/swyithe@unimelb.edu.au>

science.org.au/natcoms/nc-astronomy.html<http://science.org.au/natcoms/nc-astronomy.html>
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