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By Kim Breland and Jim Hesser, National Office
Oct 28, 2009, 15:24
Dear IYA Supporter:
As you recall, when we embarked on this year-long national celebration of astronomy in January, we set a goal of reaching at least 1,000,000 Canadians with a Galileo Moment of significant, engaging astronomical experience. At the time, this seemed like a huge and ambitious number, and we had no idea if we would be successful in reaching this goal.
We are thrilled to tell you that we have gone well over the goal – and it’s only October, with many events from National S&T Week remaining to be reported!
As of October 28, the counter sits at 1,003,238 GMs.
This is a sign of the unprecedented success of IYA in Canada – and a sign of the hard work and dedication of thousands of volunteers across the country. The Executive Committee and Advisory Board are extremely impressed with the quality, variety and creativity of IYA events. We hope that you will take a moment to reflect on this wonderful success and to feel proud of your part in it. Please also make sure that you pass this message on to all of the IYA volunteers that you have worked with; they are the reason that we have so much to celebrate.
The reason that the GM counter jumped by 20,000 GMs in one evening, getting us over 1,000,000, was because an Observatory reported the attendance from all of their programs between March and October. We know that there are other Science Centres, Planetariums and Museums who have not reported their GMs. PLEASE log in and do this today!
Now that we’ve surpassed our goal, why do we care? We are continuing to fundraise for the IYA legacy projects extending well beyond IYA (at least until 2011, thanks to our Promo Science grant). Every GM that you have generated will improve our chances of continuing the wonderful work we collectively have started in 2009. Please report your attendance numbers today and share in the excitement of seeing the GM counter go up by many more thousands! How high can we reach by 31 December???
Those that are up to date on reporting, we thank you. And we send hearty congratulations to every volunteer in Canada who helped make this happen! YOU ROCK!!!!!
Kim Breland and Jim Hesser