School Visits …

Thanks to funding support from an STFC Public Engagement Large Award (2016), all school visits from our mobile outreach team will be undertaken free of charge. Once a school visit has been agreed and scheduled, the AfRIS team will do their best to deliver the workshop on the agreed date. However, the remote nature of the communities that we’ll be visiting means that this may not always be possible due to unforeseen circumstances, such as poor weather, missed travel connections or mechanical breakdown. If this does occur, then we will try our best to reschedule the visit where possible.

To assist us in preparing for, and evaluating our visit, we do ask for the following input from schools: (i) Local knowledge and advice on making travel and accommodation arrangements, (ii) help in arranging and promoting community events, (iii) where agreed, working with the team to establish and maintain a science club at your school, and (iv) completing and returning information and evaluation questionnaires in a timely manner.

As a funding requirement, we need to undertake a formal evaluation of our community visits. This will involve a brief survey at three points – (1) two weeks before our visit, (2) on the day and (3) three months after our visit. The teacher questionnaires will not take longer than 10-15 minutes each, but will provide us with invaluable data on the impact of our project, and could potentially hand the project a longer term future. The only identifiable information we will publish from the surveys will be the name of the school/community we visit, the date of our visit and the numbers participating in workshop activities. All other survey data will be anonymised and combined in order to gauge the broader impact of our visits. There will also be three short student questionnaires (less than 10 minutes each), which aim to be fun and will allow us to assess their interest in science. We would ask teachers to hand these out in class, collect them in once completed and then return them to us.

Health and Safety …

All activities and demonstrations are created to be low risk, but it is the responsibility of host schools and teachers to check that activities comply with the schools own health and safety guidance. If any activities are of concern, then we would ask teachers to point out their concerns before or during the workshop. We would also ask schools to ensure that a member of staff is available to monitor the children’s behaviour and actions during all AfRIS workshops and take the appropriate action (if necessary) to ensure the safety and well being of all participants.

Use of Images …

We would like to publicise our activities by way of a visit report, so will be taking the occasional photo during our workshops. We will always check whether schools are happy with this at the time of booking and again on the day of our visit. If there are any children or staff who do not wish to appear in our promotional, news or showcasing items, then please let us know. We will never display a child’s name alongside any images. If any concerns arise after publication, then please let us know, and will rectify them in a timely manner.

AfRIS Online Community …

After our visit, schools will be encouraged to maintain contact with us through an online community hosted by our parent organisation, the National Schools’ Observatory (NSO). There will be no charge for this support, and we will try our best to answer questions, provide resources and offer advice in a timely manner, but this may not always be possible due to staff leave, illness etc. No liability can be accepted where information provided causes loss or damage.

Use of our robotic telescope …

Schools will be offered free access to our robotic telescope – the Liverpool Telescope. We cannot guarantee that any requested observation will be carried out. Factors such as weather, maintenance and telescope time availability may prevent observations being undertaken, however, every effort will be made to re-schedule observations where possible.

We reserve the right to limit or restrict access to observations and observing requests in the event of an apparent security breach. In such circumstances we will send out new passwords as soon as possible.

Schools are given the right to use their observations for non-commercial and educational purposes only. All other use must be agreed with the operators of the telescope.

Software …

All NSO software has been tested prior to being made available for general use by registered users; however, we cannot guarantee reliability in all circumstances. It is recommended that software is installed by somebody with knowledge of your system and tested before use with students.

A site licence for all NSO software is allocated to each user on registration and entitles the registered user to make copies of NSO software for educational purposes.

Support with Observing …

All support is given freely and to the best of our ability, and no liability can be taken where information provided causes loss or damage.

Limitations of Liability …

In no event will Liverpool John Moores University be liable to you for any consequential, indirect, incidental, punitive or special damages that may occur whilst accessing the AfRIS or NSO website, or using NSO software / computer-based learning resources for whatever purpose.

Data Protection …

Information provided by schools and users when registering with the National Schools’ Observatory will be kept within Liverpool John Moores University and may be used by the University to send marketing material and information to the named user or school representative. Other than that, identifiable data will NOT be passed on to any other third parties without your consent.

Liverpool John Moores University is registered with the Data Protection Act.

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If you have any questions about the terms and conditions, then please get in touch.