Interim Director's Message
Published in the RSAA Lunations
Vol1 Issue37 1–28 February 2023
Welcome to the first Lunations of 2023! I hope that most of you had a restful break over the December and January holiday season. Welcome, especially, to our new (large!) cohort of Honours students and PhD students who are just starting and the few new staff of the past month.
This Lunations comes mid-way through my four-month tenure as Interim Director. The first two months in this role have given me an amazing, new view of many RSAA activities. I enjoyed celebrating the end of the year with AITC staff at the Yacht Club and getting on top of AITC activities through my role on the AITC Leadership Team. I made a trip to Siding Spring in early January, where I really appreciated seeing the dedicated work of the staff there (and making a random appearance on Sunrise breakfast tv!).
Over the past two months there has been some shuffling of roles in the RSAA Executive and around the school: Mark Krumholz has moved onto the Associate Director - Academic role, Michael Ireland has stepped into the role of Associate Director - Education and Helmut Jerjen is acting in the newly created Associate Director - HDR role. Meanwhile, Tony Travouillon has taken on his new role as Associate Dean - HDR in the College of Science, while Emily Wisnioski has taken the Chair of our Thesis Oversight Committee.
In January we had two big anniversaries: 10 years since the bushfires at Siding Spring, which destroyed the Lodge (and led to a new, better lodge!) and 20 years since the bushfires that destroyed so much at Mt Stromlo. Remembering the loss associated with those two events has been powerful. It's also impressive to see how RSAA rebounded from those events to become better than ever at both sites. If you haven’t already, I encourage you to watch the video remembering the 2003 fires.
You will have seen in Brian Schmidt's message to all staff, he intends to step down as Vice Chancellor at the end of the year and return to RSAA as a member of the faculty. While this will clearly be a big change for the University as a whole, it will be delightful to welcome Brian back into RSAA!
Finally, I will be away in the UK February 6 - 13 February to Chair the SKA Observatory Science and Engineering Advisory Committee meeting. Mark Krumholz will be Acting Director while I am away.
Selected upcoming events:
Semester 1 begins - 20 February
CoS Executive retreat - 21 February
RSAA Executive meeting - 22 February
All School meeting - 23 February
Astronomy Australia Ltd update to ANU - 3 March
Stuart Wyithe starts as RSAA Director - 3 April
Naomi McClure-Griffiths
