So glad to hear you appreciate some of the schedule challenges our students face. There are excellent reasons that we offer astronomy’s practical sessions at midnight - and have done so for far more than a century, I might add. While it does have some temporary inconveniences, I can confirm that generations of teachers, students, and heads of the school have recognised both the importance of astronomy to the overall programme, and the reasons for scheduling it as we do.
Now, I know it’s been a long time since your own astronomy classes, but I’m quite sure that Alcor Bobbin, my predecessor, must have given you the same lecture he gave to my class. In short that while we can see the brightest stars really quite easily, that much of what we study involves fainter stars or further ones - or even objects like galaxies, nebulae, or other objects that can only be seen in the darkest possible environs.
Today, sunset was about 7:25pm, and the sky appears to be dark to most untrained eyes not long after 8. But in fact, due to the angle of the earth’s axis, our latitude, and the movement of the sun, it is not truly dark - dark enough for us to do the detailed work required for OWLs and NEWTs - until hours later. More than half the year, we have a quite narrow window of opportunity for that work.
Likewise, we must have clear skies to do our best observing, and it takes time for the cloudy patterns, fog, and mist that often roll through at dusk to clear. While I usually have a good idea by curfew whether we will be outside or not that evening (drawing, of course, on my extensive experience studying and working here), it is often much less certain earlier in the day.
And finally there are some details - far too trivial for you to bother with, it not being your field - about how some of the calculations and observations we learn to take for ritual magic purposes (some of the greater locational magics, for example) must be done at precisely midnight for standardisation reasons. Thus, looking at the stars as they are at a consistent point in time each evening helps our students take these skills and apply them to their later lives in the most practical way possible.
Now, I’m glad to say that I’d already considered the particular challenges facing our fifth years at the moment. This week, I offered that on nights where it is clearly going to be cloudy, we could hold our evening session at 9pm, instead of midnight. However, I don’t know whether that will be the case for any given day until at least suppertime. And, of course, it is only through the development of my projections project - again, I won’t trouble you with the details, but my astronomy colleagues do consider it most innovative - that I can take this step without entirely derailing student learning for the week.
I do hope that’s all clear. If not, you know I love to discuss my chosen field, and would gladly explain further to you, if you really wish to immerse yourself in the complexities (though it does involve a little intermediate Arithmancy, I admit.) While I simply can’t accomodate your request - and certainly would not ask Septima for a further change at this point - I’m sure you can find some other solution for the fifth years.
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branchandroot
Re: Private message to Aurora Sinistra
Date: 2012-09-17 01:33 am (UTC)So glad to hear you appreciate some of the schedule challenges our students face. There are excellent reasons that we offer astronomy’s practical sessions at midnight - and have done so for far more than a century, I might add. While it does have some temporary inconveniences, I can confirm that generations of teachers, students, and heads of the school have recognised both the importance of astronomy to the overall programme, and the reasons for scheduling it as we do.
Now, I know it’s been a long time since your own astronomy classes, but I’m quite sure that Alcor Bobbin, my predecessor, must have given you the same lecture he gave to my class. In short that while we can see the brightest stars really quite easily, that much of what we study involves fainter stars or further ones - or even objects like galaxies, nebulae, or other objects that can only be seen in the darkest possible environs.
Today, sunset was about 7:25pm, and the sky appears to be dark to most untrained eyes not long after 8. But in fact, due to the angle of the earth’s axis, our latitude, and the movement of the sun, it is not truly dark - dark enough for us to do the detailed work required for OWLs and NEWTs - until hours later. More than half the year, we have a quite narrow window of opportunity for that work.
Likewise, we must have clear skies to do our best observing, and it takes time for the cloudy patterns, fog, and mist that often roll through at dusk to clear. While I usually have a good idea by curfew whether we will be outside or not that evening (drawing, of course, on my extensive experience studying and working here), it is often much less certain earlier in the day.
And finally there are some details - far too trivial for you to bother with, it not being your field - about how some of the calculations and observations we learn to take for ritual magic purposes (some of the greater locational magics, for example) must be done at precisely midnight for standardisation reasons. Thus, looking at the stars as they are at a consistent point in time each evening helps our students take these skills and apply them to their later lives in the most practical way possible.
Now, I’m glad to say that I’d already considered the particular challenges facing our fifth years at the moment. This week, I offered that on nights where it is clearly going to be cloudy, we could hold our evening session at 9pm, instead of midnight. However, I don’t know whether that will be the case for any given day until at least suppertime. And, of course, it is only through the development of my projections project - again, I won’t trouble you with the details, but my astronomy colleagues do consider it most innovative - that I can take this step without entirely derailing student learning for the week.
I do hope that’s all clear. If not, you know I love to discuss my chosen field, and would gladly explain further to you, if you really wish to immerse yourself in the complexities (though it does involve a little intermediate Arithmancy, I admit.) While I simply can’t accomodate your request - and certainly would not ask Septima for a further change at this point - I’m sure you can find some other solution for the fifth years.
ad beneficio doctrinam as my mentor used to say.
A.