2nd Annual Report OPTICON Optical Infrared Co-ordination ...

Specific Publicity: announcements of opportunity
4. Trans-national Access Programme. Impact, progress and output
Beyond the daily operation and promotion of the Access Programme, the Access Office is
carrying out an important effort to accomplish EC requirements (annual reports, etc.) and to
analyse the impact and progress of this activity, by assessing the scientific output, user
questionnaires and feedbacks, identifying new users, analyzing the procedure of awarding
time, etc.
4.1 Progress reports to be delivered in accordance to Annex I of the contract.
Each four-month period, the Access Office has delivered standard progress reports by
collecting and providing to the Telescope Directors’ Forum detailed statistics about type and
characteristics of observing runs supported under the Access Programme (see table with such
deliverables).
4.2 User questionnaires and feedbacks
User groups awarded telescope time under this Access Programme have been invited to
complete a user questionnaire.
Information from these questionnaires and feedback tells us more about the various users of
the Access Programme. This information helps us to understand our users' needs and their
opinion about the services provided. It enables us to meet those needs by making the Access
Programme as useful as possible.
4.3 International partnership. Analysis of current situation and trends.
The Access Programme provides opportunities for international partnerships that contribute to
implement an effective, efficient, and focused international astronomical research.
As part of the analysis carried out by the Access Office to monitor the impact of the Access
Programme among the Astronomical Community, we have analyzed the establishment of
such international partnership in those observing projects awarded time under the OPTICON
Telescopes during 2004 and 2005.
4.4 Scientific fields addressed by OPTICON user teams.
The astronomical research carried out under the OPTICON Access Programme is focussed in
optical and infrared observing projects as well as in solar physics observations. As part of the
progress and outputs of the Access Programme in this period, the Access Office has collected
all the projects summary reports of such observing projects asking astronomers for their
corresponding scientific fields
4.5 Analysis of procedures for awarding time.
Current situation and possible scenarios for a better coordination and optimisation of
telescope time.
The Access Office carried out a specific study about the procedure for awarding time at
telescopes under the OPTICON Access Programme.
Gathering all this information is contributing to analyse those synergies between the different
selection procedures, setting up the bottom line to discuss the approach that could be achieved
in benefit of the astronomical community.
Milestone for this WP, as defined by the contract, has been successfully achieved. Likewise,
34 Contract [RII3-CT-2004-001566]
Annual Report