UNAWE is an international outreach activity that uses the beauty and grandeur of the universe to inspire very young disadvantaged children. Goals are to:
After hundreds of submissions from 34 countries during the course of a month, Naming X, a global online competition launched in honour and memory of Venetia Burney Phair, who named the minor planet Pluto in 1930, aged 11, can reveal its winners and runners up!
In April 2010 Naming X asked young minds around the globe to suggest a suitable name for a minor planet and a reason why. Applicants were required to adhere to competition guidelines and suggestions were accepted in three categories, under 11years, +12years, and schools & groups.
Read the list of winning names on the Naming X website here!
Winners will receive a signed certificate, telescope time care of Bellatrix Observatory, Italy and a copy of the award-winning documentary of Venetia’s story, Naming Pluto and film poster, care of Father Films.
Winners’ suggested names will be included in a formal paper to the International Astronomical Union’s (IAU) Committee for Small Body Nomenclature (CSBN).
Our partners from ANIC "Asociación de Niños Indagadores del cosmos", meaning "Association of Children Inquirers of the Universe" organised a Lunar Eclipse viewing and were awed by its beauty. They write:
At around 4.20 in the morning local time, we were 'surprised' by the partially eclipsed moon visible through the blue dawn. It was a seemingly large moon, just above the horizon
On the 6th June 2010 UNAWE-Tanzania finalized the project it intended to do with the kids at SOS Children Centre in Dar es Salaam. My Star event involved each child of the village on which children were taking a star sticker and stick it on a black paper which represent a night dark sky and formed a known constellation. Each child who placed a star on the paper wrote his/her name beside that star which marks participation on the program and a memory to let these kids become more connected to the sky above when they find and look onto their respective stars in the sky above from wherever they are in on the globe.
Five girls from a primary school in the village of Dwingeloo, in Northern Netherlands, were invited to attend the opening of LOFAR, a brand new radio telescope, the biggest yet. They took part in the opening ceremony. One of them, Lisa, was asked about her wish to become an astronomer. Then then invited the Queen who joined them on stage. She pressed a symbolic button and officially inaugurated the telescope under a thunder of applause from the 800 people attending.
The girls were thrilled, and so were their parents. The reason for their involvement was more than the inauguration of LOFAR, so stay tuned for more news...
After hundreds of submissions from 34 countries during the course of a month, Naming X, a global online competition launched in honour and memory of Venetia Burney Phair, who named the minor planet Pluto in 1930, aged 11, can reveal its winners and runners up!
