As president of the Astronomy Foundation, the telescope industry association and outreach group, I’m proud to announce the appointment of John Schroer as Planetarium Committee chair. John is a highly energetic planetarium wizard, amateur astronomer, and outreach promoter. He is the planetarium education coordinator at the Detroit Science Center, is a graduate of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio (my old school!), and an alum of the Schenectady Museum in New York; the Boonshoft Museum of Discovery in Dayton, Ohio; and the Cincinnati Museum of Natural History.

John’s energy and talents will help the foundation connect with planetaria as well as help improve its astronomy education and outreach events. He is also the driving force behind Detroit’s highly successful annual event Kensington Astronomy at the Beach, a model of a large-scale cooperative urban star party. For more on this event, which this year takes place September 21–22, see: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~dgs/kensington/.

Welcome, John!