The University’s planetarium attracts college students, school groups and general public audiences for the shared experience of learning more about the universe. Operated by the Department of Physics and Astronomy, the dome-shaped theater offers a wide array of educational shows and other activities.

The planetarium can seat up to 114 guests and typically has four student staff members at a given time. One of its current operators is Cody James Barth, a physics major with minors in math and astronomy.

“Right now we’re running a show about the science of black holes, and after this weekend, we’ll be switching over to ‘From Earth to the Universe,’” he said.

Barth’s position of planetarium console operator entails running the computer behind all the seats, so everything functions smoothly during the shows.

“We are responsible for running the console while Dr. Smith, the planetarium director, does all the star talk. At the beginning of each show, he’ll give a brief overview of what the sky looks like that night, and then we’ll talk about a few constellations,” he said.

“Basically, we work in the background, in the dark so that nobody knows what we’re doing,” Barth said.

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Barth happens to be studying subjects closely related to the field of astronomy, but that doesn’t mean being a console operator is exclusively reserved for math and science students. A lot of the observatory stargaze staff is comprised of people from different majors.

“Essentially, the only criteria to get on stargaze staff is to have taken a general astronomy course. After that, you could talk to Dr. Smith, who does the interviewing and hiring in the spring term. You go through a whole semester’s worth of training here at the planetarium. Once you’re on stargaze staff, that’s where he finds people for the planetarium job,” Barth said.

The planetarium was constructed in 1984, at the same time as the rest of the building. It was renovated in 2013 and 2014 to display astronomy shows on a fully-digital “SciDome” system, but select artifacts of the original system remain.

“I did an independent study with Dr. Smith, and we worked on digitizing the old slideshows so we could show them on the newer digital system. Dr. Smith made a conscious decision to keep the old Minolta projector here in the center of the room. A lot of planetariums get rid of all the old stuff when they do a renovation, and Dr. Smith actually talks about the history of the planetarium a bit during his shows,” Barth said.

This year’s current and upcoming planetarium shows include:

“From Earth to the Universe” from Oct. 14 – Nov. 18

“Secrets of the Star” from Nov. 30 – Dec. 14

“The Alien Who Stole Christmas” on Dec. 1 and 8

Show times:

Sunday at 7:30 p.m.

Tuesday at 8 p.m.

Friday at 8 p.m.

Saturday at 2:00 p.m.