Message from the President

Seeing that this is the second consecutive Message from the President, this may well become a tradition.

The Society's fall Board meeting was held November 28th in Montréal where we discussed a number of important issues, from the long-range planning process to the possibility of Canada hosting the 2006 IAU General Assembly. Let me mention two items of immediate interest to the entire community that emerged from this meeting.

On behalf of CASCA Board, I am pleased to announce that Dr. Ian Halliday, formerly of NRC, has agreed to act as CASCA's representative on the Canadian Consortium for Research (CCR). As I noted in last fall's Message, the CCR is effectively a lobby group concerned with the funding of research in all sectors and the support of post-secondary education. It is hoped that CASCA and astronomy will ultimately achieve a higher profile in Ottawa through this initiative. It should be noted that Ian has kindly agreed to do this on a voluntary basis.

I also have the pleasure of announcing that CASCA now has its first publicity officer, Dr. Robert Lamontagne of the Université de Montréal, who is a Resident Astronomer for the Observatoire du mont Mégantic. Robert currently devotes half his time to research, and the other half to technical matters such as instrumentation. He also teaches at UQAM. The explicit nature of this position will be articulated in a future communication, but the Society is grateful that Robert has volunteered to act in this capacity. He has already been involved in writing press releases for the long-range planning process, by the way.

Canadian astronomers have enjoyed and continue to enjoy a reputation for excellence within the world-wide astronomical community. But scientific excellence is not sufficient to keep the Canadian community healthy--e.g., with access to appropriate levels of funding and first-rate facilities. CASCA Board recognizes that astronomy must achieve a higher profile with the public and politicians if it is to flourish in the next century. This is why these new initiatives, along with a reinvigorated Education Committee, are so essential for our continued success.

At the time of writing, the long-range planning process is in high gear, with two town-hall meetings having been held, and two more to go (Calgary and Victoria). Judging by my experiences in Montréal and Toronto, it appears that the astronomical community recognizes the importance of this exercise and has risen to the challenge. I witnessed a number of thoughtful and creative presentations in these two centres, as well as some lively exchanges. I expect this to continue on the Long Range Planning Panel's western swing.

For members of our community who were unable to participate in one of the town-hall meetings, I strongly encourage you to make your views heard, either through the Long Range Planning Panel website forum, or by commenting on a draft version of the document when it becomes available in the new year. (This will be announced via our e-mail exploder.) Analogous to the process itself, there is no guarantee that the views you share will be represented in the final plan. But your views will certainly not be included if you choose to remain silent.
 

Finally, I would like to wish you a very happy holiday and a successful New Year.

Michael De Robertis  President of CASCA      <mmdr@yorku.ca> Michael, Professor of Physics and Astronomy at York University, is the current President of CASCA. He obtained his BSc at the University of Toronto (1997), his MSc at Queen's University (1979) and his PhD at the University of Victoria (1983). De Robertis completed two years of postdoctoral work at the Lick Observatory (UC Santa Cruz) before taking up a University Research Fellowship at York University in late 1985.  His research interests focus primarily on the activity in galactic nuclei using optical and near-infrared imaging and spectroscopic techniques. He has also developed an interest in Galactic structure and the low-mass end of the main sequence.