The Kinneret Academic College is launching the first robotic telescope in Israel that anyone can make observations with

The robotic telescope that will be placed on campus will be accessible to the public - remotely. Through a dedicated website, you can now order photographs of the Great Bear or the North Star directly to your mobile phone. According to the president of the college, the new project is intended to bring about a real revolution in the field of education

This week the first robotic telescope in Israel that will be accessible to the general public was inaugurated at Kinneret Academic College. "There are about 50 observatories in Israel, most of which are not accessible to the public on a day-to-day basis", according to retired Prof. David Fondak, an amateur astronomer who founded and headed the physics studies unit at Kinneret Academic College for 7 years. "Furthermore, one of the problems that space enthusiasts encounter is that not every day there are optimal conditions for stargazing."

So what does a robotic telescope even mean? Unlike other telescopes, where we look directly into the lens of the telescope and are sure that our eyelashes are aliens on the moon, the robotic telescope will be operated remotely, through a dedicated website, where you can order a photo of the various celestial bodies of your choice. When there are good visibility conditions, the telescope will take the requested photo and send it directly to our email address.

"Beyond the new technology that will be available to the male and female students at our college, this is nothing less than a revolution in the field of education," explains Prof. Hazi Ofir, the new president of Kinneret Academic College. "The site, and in fact the use of the telescope, will be open to the entire public. Our college has always aspired to connect and make academic knowledge accessible to the general public and to daily practice, believing that academic knowledge is not the property of researchers only. There is no reason why a boy or girl in the third grade who wants to do work for a science class on outer space should not be able to get access to the findings that the advanced technologies available today allow us to obtain."

to the telescope site

More of the topic in Hayadan:

• We must excite the youth about space
• The era of tiny satellites / Prof. Haim Ashad
• Science has progressed, the fundamental questions remain open. In memory of Zvi Yanai