Public Event Advisory Board – 2 December 2025

Present: Antonella Del Rosso, Barbara Solich, Chiara Mariotti, Dante Larini, Loraine Massarotti, François Briard, Enrique Rico Ortega, Mélissa Gaillard, Zoe Nikolaidou

General housekeeping

Frederick Bordry is no-longer a board member as he offered his resignation. The Committee thanks him warmly for all his support throughout the years.

25-25 cultural season mid-term review

A general mid-term review of the season was shared.

A point was mentionned about the no-shows, which are on average 30% (it was also higher (60%) during the event “Un bestiaire raconté”, a performance for children and families, which is a noteworthy lesson learned). 

François shared that we have access to the people who do not show up. One point was made to share with them a gentle and subtle email about them not turning up, with a reminde about the next events to come. This point deserves reflection.

26-27 cultural season discussion

To gather feedback from the Board members, a discussion was organised to take into account their views, which also resulted from brainstorming sessions with some of them (see slide 11 of the PPT and below)

2026-27 Brainstorming sessions results – priorities chosen by participants and general comment

Enrique

• 1.Go deeper in physics in a comfortable way 
• 8.Battle against disinformation 

Antonella 

• 4.Focus on tangible tech applications from CERN
• 11.While facing today’s technical issues: need to reinforce our creativity in solving issues (link with culture)

Chiara

• 11.While facing today’s technical issues: need to reinforce our creativity in solving issues (link with culture)
• 10.Fear on morale 
• 17. 2026: celebrate what we have and the end of LHC run 3 and its achievements

Barbara 

• 3. Reassuring about the future (positive)
• 7. Paradigm change in new CERN tech: social applications as part of conception, not only spin-off
• Furthermore: it is important not only to focus on tech applications, but on societal impact, and about the contributions by and for the people.

Melissa

• 15. Consider exciting applications of tech (superconductivity) (but see it in a broader perspective, also with societal impact)
• 14. European Strategy on Particle Physics update
• Furthermore: it would be important to consider at the same time the short-term future and long-term future 

Francois

• 9.HI-LUMI: challenge to build: need to anticipate future (furthermore, François highlighted the communication campaign of Space X as an example, whereby communicating about their launch failures allowed them to have a strong impact on the communication of their successes.)
• 14. European strategy of particle physics (and also the CERN governance, as communicated by the conferences of Michel Spiro).
• Furthermore: we already discussed about the present applications and achievements through the CERN 70 campaign of events.

Loraine 

• 5. Embrace diversity in cultural season
• Events from physicists : More should be done for our audience to meet and interact with physicists
• Furthermore: Let us not forget the CERN touch on our events.

Zoe

• 8.Battle against disinformation and “return to dark ages”: CERN and science are custodian of information
• Also: We need to be clearer regarding what we wish to achieve, as per the target audiences.

More generally, it was revealed that a strong attempt of linking all events to CERN’s activities is highly important. Small introductions about CERN per event was shared as a nice addition to this idea.

Presentation of events – comments from the board

Dark Matter Night: It would be important to involve CERN AND other researchers (LAPP, UNIGE etc.) It is a nice opportunity to involve users and showcase their diversity. 

Les Créatives: A link with science or CERN would be important.

Concert: The History of the Universe: a link with science is necessary because there are many local orchestras that want to use the room. Chiara shared the programme which revealed that it is planned to be the case. A follow-up will be needed.

Die Physiker: good potential, need to targer heavily German-speaking community. A discussion with a CERN scientist is also important to have, we need to reflect on how to do so.

AOB

François: If there are extra slots for 26-27 season, make sure it’s not music, or theatre, as we could plan conferences aligned to the theme

Barbara: Thursdays and weekends better for receptions