Building a School Observatory

Mercury, November/December 2003 Table of Contents

Image courtesy of Bill Owen.

by Roger Knacke, Darren Williams, and Jonathan Hall

Developing a college or high school observatory will greatly improve science programs, and it’s not as expensive as you might think.

Few of us have ever forgotten the thrill of our first look through a telescope. The view of the Moon or Jupiter added to the wonder and mystery of the stars. That experience, augmented by a big telescope and a dome against the night sky, thrills the most casual skygazer, even in the days of planetary missions, Hubble images, and the Internet.

An astronomical observatory at a college or high school can greatly enhance astronomy, physics, and Earth science programs. It offers a way for scientists to reach out to the public and bring visibility and excitement to science. We’ve recently built an astronomical observatory at Penn State Erie, The Behrend College, with a generous gift by the Robert M. Mehalso family of Rochester, New York. Our experience developing the observatory might be useful to others who are considering construction of astronomical facilities.

We designed the Mehalso Observatory for education and outreach, not for fundamental astronomical research, although we strongly encourage undergraduate research projects. In such an observatory, commercial telescopes with apertures of 6 to 20 inches give detailed views of planets, stars, and bright nebulae. An observatory planned with these goals can be built and maintained for relatively modest costs, and is a unique addition to a science program.

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