Setting up CERN’s new technical training courses raised important questions. How far was it CERN’s job to provide this sort of education? Could anyone be persuaded to teach classes when they were already too busy with own work? Would they be any good at it, since most were more used to presenting conference papers and academic lectures?

The training had been requested by CERN’s machine operators, workshop staff and laboratory assistants, and 279 people signed up in the first year. The courses, which included practical demonstrations and exercises, proved very popular and were extended to provide staff with specialist knowledge they could not easily get elsewhere and keep them up to date with modern techniques.

Read more in the December 1962 CERN Courier,
in the June 1962 report to the CERN Council
or in this overview (in French) from 1 June 1967.