The George I. Alden Trust has granted Lycoming College $150,000 for updated instrumentation in the Detwiler Planetarium including a new projection system, software, and increased computing power. This is the sixth grant awarded to Lycoming by the Alden Trust since 2005, bringing a total of $710,000 in support.

When the Lynn Science Center opened in 2015, its digital planetarium was state-of-the-art. Heavily used for both curricular instruction and as an important and popular point of educational outreach to the local community — logging 595 hours just since Fall 2020 — the system’s nearly decade-old instrumentation began failing and replacement parts had fallen into obsolescence.

During the 2023-24 academic year, the planetarium hosted 36 non-curricular, community-oriented shows with a total attendance of 1,617. Included were programs for high school students, scout troops, the local Chamber of Commerce’s leadership program, and the City’s First Friday program, for which the free planetarium shows consistently resulted waiting lists.

“Through the generous grant from the Alden Trust, the planetarium system’s instrumentation has been revived with new technology to provide a streamlined, center-module projection system, higher capacity computing, and expanded software for increased diversity of images and shows,” commented Melissa Kiehl, astronomy/physics laboratory and planetarium manager.

“The planetarium upgrades represent Lycoming’s continuation of strategic institutional investment in the sciences and will allow for ongoing and enhanced opportunities for course-based pedagogy, student-led applications, and community outreach,” said Melissa Morris, Ph.D., assistant professor of astronomy. Lycoming intends to host a grand re-opening for the community in early 2025.

“Astronomy/physics is a strong program at Lycoming, particularly for a small liberal arts college,” added Emily Wilson, Ph.D., assistant professor of astrophysics and planetarium director. “Our program provides students with lab-based theoretical instruction and experiential learning and research opportunities with cutting-edge instrumentation. We have 30 students currently declared as majors — a top 10 program in terms of enrollment at Lycoming — with increasingly significant women representation.”

Lycoming awards bachelor of science degrees in both astrophysics and physics and bachelor of arts degrees in astronomy and physics. The planetarium serves students in these majors, as well as non-majors and first-year seminar students.

Beyond its capacity for astronomy education traditional to planetariums, the new instrumentation features multi-disciplinary capabilities, with programs for earth science, biology, chemistry, and related sciences already integrated. Additionally, because the system is cloud-connected, it can download open-access prepared shows or offer live “domecasts” from other institutions, including top science centers and planetariums around the world.

Further, the system can be tailored for other purposes, both academic and outreach, because any media can be integrated. Other academic disciplines can utilize the projection system for presentations. Administrative offices, such as admissions, can use the planetarium for recruitment events as well.

“Because the system controls are customizable, students will be able to experiment with the system and design their own shows. This will especially benefit our students enrolled in the Planetarium Techniques course, but it can also be used by students for presentations in other disciplines,” said Kiehl.

The George I. Alden Trust focuses on capital projects that contribute significantly to the intellectual growth of students in higher education. Funds are predominately allocated to independent undergraduate institutions that demonstrate a combination of educational excellence, exciting programming, and efficient and effective administration, with an undergraduate population of at least 1,000 and at most 5,000 students.