2010/2011 NAS Activity Report

Since not every member could attend the AGM, here is a recap of the activities we reported to the group.

1. A couple of years ago we had 5-12 people at regular meetings. now 30 to 45 is common and we have had over 60 when the topic is hot
2. Last year we had 20 paid members, now we have 60 members, a 300% increase
3. Last year, we had about 1,000 people at our library event, this year about 1,500 - a 50% increase
4. Through our library and museum events, we connected with 1,000s of people to spark their interest in the night sky
5. We have a regular newsletter every month.  Thanks to Howard Duck who took it over from me and made a great graphic design for it.
6. We went from Zero to list of 282 people who signed up for our email list who are interested in our events.  There is more "wonder" at the night sky than we thought!

2010/2011 Sample Outreach events

• Nanaimo Harbourfront Library
• Nanaimo Museum
• Goldstream Nature House
• Gyro Club
• Parksville Library
• Nanoose Naturalists
• Opening the Door - High School Students
• Maffeo Sutton and Paine Horticultural Centre public viewing sessions

The board of directors spends a lot of volunteer time meeting and organizing the society's events and activities.  We highlighted a few of the great things that board members have done over the last year.

• Rich Fortier - president, - organized a lot of outreach and arranged speakers at every observing session, got on TV with Kai
• Pal Virag - vice president - organized wonderful multimedia displays, lets us use his library of space posters and his meteorite collection.
• Ian McDougall - helped bring out telescopes to viewing events
• Gilbert Beaudry - always the first to be there to move tables and help setup AND paid for the clubs web site hosting for the last year
• Ruth Downey - events and thank you program
• James Slater - in addition to handling our finances and membership director, has come out to many outreach sessions and brought VIU scopes
• Bill Weller - professional astronomer - huge amount of outreach that he does himself.
• Garland - web site, observers group, events, marketing

Volunteer Thank Yous
In addition to the board of directors, we have a great group of member volunteers that make our society's events successful.  Here are the ones we recognized.  If we missed anyone, let us know.

• Dennis & Lydia - events & brought scope
• Chris Boar - events & brought scope
• George and Ryan Clarke - events & public observing sessions - multiple scopes and educational materials
• Patricia Giovando - events
• Howard Duck - newsletter
• Kim Shotton - helps with observing sessions
• David Burns - events
• Malcolm Comyn - events
• Jeff Wenschlag - events
• Randy Krall - runs telescope from laptop at events
• Sayuri Kubota- who organizes the food for BBQs, gives feedback on graphic designs and lets us steal Rich

The setup and teardown at library event was flawless - we finished teardown 20 minutes earlyMany of our board members are also both running and volunteering at these events.

It was an amazing year for the Nanaimo Astronomy Society and thanks to the volunteers and board members who made it possible.