We are regularly asked by organisations to provide assistance with astronomy related topics, as well as running public star parties throughout the observing season. Please see further information regarding our outreach offer on this page. As a small local charity, we cannot always fulfil requests as we have a limited number of volunteers.
Public Stargazing
We run regular Public Stargazing Nights at Dalby Forest, which is where our observatories are located. These ‘Public Stargazing Nights’ start at 8pm on the 1st Friday of October, November, December, February and March each year – see our event calendar or eventbrite page.
On clear nights, the public can expect to see countless stars overhead as the Milky Way is visible from this location, as well as galaxies, planets and nebulae through the society’s array of telescopes.
On cloudy nights, we offer an outdoor talk and/or virtual tour of the night sky as well as a chance to see the telescopes in the observatories. Unfortunately if it is scheduled for rain, the event will be cancelled as we have no access to an indoor space.
We have previously attracted a group of 500 members of the public, when we ran an event in conjunction with the BBC ‘Stargazing Live’ programme.
We do not charge a fee for attending our events, however booking is required via eventbrite as places are limited. Entry to Dalby Forest is chargeable at all times by Forestry England and managed by way of a Pay-on-Exit automated barrier system. We are able to provide attendees to our event with a one-time-use code which will entitle them to a reduced rate when paying to leave the Forest after the event.
Our amateur astronomers are all volunteers who give up their time for free to share their passion for astronomy with the community. We encourage guests to make a donation to the society to allow us to keep providing these events for free to the community, it helps us to maintain the equipment, observatories and other overheads. A suggested donation would be £2 per adult, £1 per child.
For our current schedule of public observing sessions, please visit our event calendar.
Scouts & Guide Groups
We are happy to assist local Beavers, Cubs, Scouts, Brownies and Guides with practical work towards their Astronomy / Space Activity Badges. We have helped numerous groups with the badges in the past few years, either at Dalby Forest or at their own premises.
We are happy to discuss your requirements and arrange with you to help with these badges. Again, we offer this help for free but encourage a donation to the society to help cover our running costs. A suggested donation for Scout and Guide groups would be £1 per head.
Schools
We have provided assistance to local schools with their astronomy aspects of the National Curriculum, including classroom based discussions and evening star parties with pupils and parents. We have limited availability to attend schools for this type of outreach due to our volunteer members having to fit society engagements around their personal employment, however we are happy to discuss requests and see if we can assist, or offer alternatives. A donation to the society would be appreciated for any assistance given in line with other types of outreach offered.
Talks for Community Groups
We have visited local WI and U3A groups to give talks on astronomy and are happy to consider visiting your group to give a talk on a topic that interests your members. Please contact us for the range of topics we can speak about and we will endevour to meet your needs. For providing a speaker to your group, we would require you to cover the speaker’s personal travel costs and would encourage an additional donation to the society.
Community Events
We regularly attend community events such as Ayton Gala and Dalbyology (previously Dalby Explorer Day) to promote astronomy and the society. Some examples of other previous events we’ve attended include Sci-Fi Scarborough, Family Fun Day for St. Catherine’s Hospice, and the 1st Yorkshire Fossil Festival.
