Vero Joseph has stars in his eyes – and now he and his students can see them at any time of the night or day.

The science head teacher at Goulburn High School was the driving force behind the establishment of a dome-shaped observatory on the school farm, complete with a high powered telescope programmed by software to rotate around the sky.

The observatory, which will be used by all schools in the Goulburn area and by local residents, opens up a galaxy of possibilities for the study of astronomy.

It’s a field that already excites students, being accessible to study and coming with a “wow” factor fuelled by popular science fiction television shows and literature.

“As a teacher I know that astronomy is one of those areas that kids find really engrossing,” Mr Joseph said.

“They are so taken by the whole notion of what’s out there, are we alone, the alien stuff, but it’s more than that.

“I love how kids respond when they look through a telescope, like seeing Saturn for the first time. It looks so amazing to see the ball and the rings around it. It defies reality.”

The observatory opened on the astronomically significant date of February 29. Both Julius Caesar and Pope Gregory used astronomy to calculate the extra day now known as the leap year day when they devised their respective calendars.

Sitting Dr Who-like in the middle of a paddock, the observatory was funded with a $48,000 grant from the Mulwaree Trust. The telescope is a 14-inch Schmidt- Cassegrain model, which automatically rotates under computer instructions and has a solar filter for safe viewing of the sun.

Astronomy is taught at Goulburn High from Years 7 to 12 and is an important part of physics in senior years. The school has had a consistently strong science candidature for the HSC for more than a decade, with 10 to 12 students annually studying physics, 15 to 25 taking biology and 10 to 15 signing up for chemistry.

But astronomy also takes a starring role in history. While en route to discover the “great southern continent”, Captain James Cook observed from Tahiti the 1769 transit of Venus over the disc of the sun in an attempt to calculate the distance from the earth to the sun. He conducted numerous astronomical observations in Australia and New Zealand and used nautical astronomy to determine latitude and longitude.