GAM 2019 Blog

by Connie Walker, co-chair of the IAU100 Dark Skies for All Global Project & director of Globe at Night

Published: Tuesday, April 02 2019 00:43

As long as Global Astronomy Month has been enjoyed by the world, Globe at Night has been a part of its Dark Skies Awareness program. Globe at Night is the citizen-science campaign that asks everyone everywhere to rate the brightness (or darkness!) of their night sky very simply by matching what he or she sees (toward the constellation designated for that month) with star charts at www.globeatnight.org/webapp/.

For Global Astronomy Month this year, we are reinitiating a great way to get you involved in the Globe at Night campaigns. Try the Adopt-a-Street program!!! Especially March 27-April 5 when the last six days of the Globe at Night campaign coincide with the International Dark Sky Week!

Tucson, Arizona, USA’s successful Adopt-a-Street program in 2012

Globe at Night is offering this “Call to Action” for those who want to take a few more measurements during the campaigns. Children and adults can “adopt a street” in their town to take visual and possibly sky-brightness meter measurements during the Globe at Night campaigns. The strategy is for people to adopt a different major or semi-major street and take measurements every mile or so for the length of the street (or for as long as they can). The grid of measurements will canvas the town, allowing for research later in comparison to wildlife, health, energy consumption and cost, among other things.

We do need someone in your city (maybe you?) to gather city street names and recruit people to adopt a street.

Are you passionate about Dark Skies? Consider coordinating an Adopt-a-Street program in your area during the 2019 Globe at Night campaigns. It is hugely simple to do. You fill out the form at https://www.globeatnight.org/aas2019.php. Besides some minimal contact information, you edit our sample instructions and provide enough street names to cover your city (25?). We will implement your sample instructions and street names on a web page just for your city and send the URL address to you.  You then can use the link to recruit people or families each to sign up to adopt a different street.

We hope you are able to participate in the Adopt-a-Street program. No matter if you choose to do that or simply take a few measurements at one location, we at Globe at Night always look forward to hearing about your adventures with the campaigns. Please tell us your stories. Contact us at [email protected].

Connie Walker is a Scientist at the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO) in Tucson, Arizona, USA. For the past 18 years at NOAO, she has enjoyed managing several education outreach programs for the public, students and teachers on hands-on general astronomy, dark skies preservation, optics and solar research. Three highlights of her job are directing the popular international light pollution citizen-science campaign Globe at Night, the high school science café project, the Teen Astronomy Café and the problem-based learning Quality Lighting Teaching Kit. To help make a difference, she is past-president and member of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific Board of Directors, president of the International Astronomical Union (IAU)’s commission on light pollution, co-chair of the IAU100 Dark Skies for All Global Project and recently on the board of directors of the International Dark-Sky Association (IDA). For her efforts in bringing dark skies awareness to the public, the IDA awarded her their Hoag-Robinson award in 2011. Her amazing astronomer-husband, daughter (23), son (20) and cat (12) thankfully tolerate her interest in the dark side of astronomy.