Educational activities

There were various courses using the NOT during period 41.Remote observations were done as part of the NOT/OSO Nordforsk summer school, see

http://www.chalmers.se/nordic-baltic-school ,

that was held June 14-23 at Onsala Space Observatory in Sweden. For this course we were extensively involved in defining the observations for the different science projects, take back-up observations in advance, and assist during the school.

We also had the regular on-site observing courses for the Stockholm University (5 nights in May) and the master school in CUO/NBI guaranteed time (3 nights in August).

A detailed description of what is offered to groups that want to use the NOT for an observational course, including general guidelines which describe the various steps in the preparation, was made and is available on our web page at

http://www.not.iac.es/education/CoursePlanning.pdf

The project `Nuestros Alumnos y el Roque de Los Muchachos' to create closer ties between the observatory and the people of La Palma by giving talks to secondary school kids on astronomy at the school and receiving them at the observatory for workshops and guided telescope tours has been developing further. Still, the program is not fully established and it remains to be seen if the full program can be supported only by the astronomers working at the ORM.

As part of the support and training of the NOT students on La Palma, regular meetings have been held with the Nordforsk post-doc and lectures by the staff where held about data reduction of NIR (NOTCam) data and long-slit spectroscopic (ALFOSC) data. An `internal' workshop is planned on the practise of image data reduction in the optical and NIR.