Shaw-IAU Workshops by the OAE

The Shaw-IAU Workshops on Astronomy for Education are a series of events organized by the Office of Astronomy for Education (OAE) of the International Astronomical Union (IAU), in support of the IAU's goal of leveraging astronomy to support teaching at primary and secondary school level.

The Shaw-IAU Workshops are organised with generous funding from the Shaw Prize Foundation.

The 1st Shaw–IAU Workshop on Astronomy for Education was held in Paris on 17–19 December, 2019, to bring representatives of the astronomy education community together on the occasion of the founding of the new OAE.

The 2nd Shaw–IAU Workshop on Astronomy for Education was held online on 6–9 October 2020 as a fully virtual event. Its main aim was to consolidate the IAU OAE's network of National Astronomy Education Coordinators (NAECs), to encourage the NAECs to make personal contact with each other and with key representatives of the IAU astronomy education community, and more generally learn about the international structures and projects that will feature prominently in the work of the OAE and the NAEC teams. Meeting topics also included common challenges faced by astronomy educators around the world, as well as a global overview of astronomy education at primary and secondary level. The meeting was also an opportunity to build collaborations, with individual, virtual face-to-face meetings between participants an integral part of the programme.

The 3rd Shaw-IAU workshop took place online between the 12th and 15 of October 2021. The theme for this workshop was "What Everybody Should Know About AStronomy Education" and the workshop included 19 sessions covering the full range of astronomy education from design to evaluation.