[AstroNet] Draft plan for IYA South Africa

[Kevin Govender]

Hello all
For transparency, please note that a draft of the IYA business plan is 
available for download on www.astronomy2009.org.za/downloads/
This will give you an idea as to what the steering committee in SA has 
been working towards following our discussions earlier this year.
We hope to be able to present a plan of this nature to the DST/DOE by 
next month.
If there's anything you feel strongly about in terms of where we might 
have gone wrong in this plan, please send those comments to me so we can 
discuss. Please understand the difficulty though in trying to 
consolidate the large number of opinions in astronomy in the country. We 
will obviously serve you as best we can though, always bearing in mind 
the objective and vision at the end of the day.
Before you ask, the budget is still being developed and would be 
something that would also be guided by potential funders. The important 
thing right now, before talk of money, is that we all stand together as 
a community and agree to the spirit and ideas of the plan and commit 
ourselves in principle to participating in realising these objectives 
during 2009.

We're getting there... and will feed back as things progress.

Next week SA will be represented at CAP2007 
(http://www.communicatingastronomy.org/cap2007/) where there will also 
be a meeting of IYA contacts from around the world. Attendees of this 
will provide feedback to this list.

This week at the ALC2007 conference (www.space.gov.za/alc2007/) there 
was great energy surrounding African collaborations around astronomy and 
space science. Watch this space as things develop. If you are 
specifically interested in astronomy around Africa please email 
africa at astronomy2009.org.za.

Regards
kg

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Kevin Govender
Manager: SALT Collateral Benefits Programme
South African Astronomical Observatory
Office: +27 21 460 9350
Mobile: +27 82 487 8466
Fax: +27 21 447 3639
Email: kg at saao.ac.za
Skype: kevindran
Website: www.saao.ac.za / www.salt.ac.za
Postal: P.O. Box 9, Observatory, Cape Town, 7935, South Africa
Street: SAAO, Observatory Road, Observatory, Cape Town, South Africa