The Challenges of Coordinating Global Science Communications

In 2003, CERN decided to conduct its science in public, and embarked on a campaign to leverage the start-up of the Large Hadron Collider to raise the profile of physics. A key part of CERN’s approach was to tell the LHC story locally, regionally and globally, such that it had as much relevance to people in Geneva, Illinois, for example, as to those in Geneva, Switzerland. This involved close coordination between participating institutions, and a degree of openness new to the laboratory.