As Director of the Vatican Observatory he was a driving force in several new educational and research initiatives. He recruited young astronomers worldwide and established a program for non-resident adjunct appointments that allowed women to participate. Women accounted for almost half the participants in the biennial Vatican Observatory Summer School he established for astronomy graduate students. In the 1990s he organized conferences at the Observatory's headquarters in Castel Gandolfo, including one titled "God's Action in the Universe" sponsored jointly with the Center for Theology and the Natural Sciences of Berkeley, California. One of his successors said Coyne only asked his hires to do "good science" and that "He created a space where we were all free to pursue that science. He acted as a firewall between us and the vagaries of the Vatican. He made us welcome and he made our collaborators and visitors welcome."