Summer 2023 - Pilot Project
Community in the Makerspace
Summer 2023
Embedded Files
Pilot Project Overview
Pilot Project Overview
MacEwan’s Makerspace was built in 2021 with the goal of building a space where students and community members could create and explore by learning how to make new things. MacEwan Librarians noted that historically marginalized individuals (students who are racialized, neurodiverse, and/or members of the 2SLGBTQ+ community) had made the makerspace, their space. As academics, we wanted to learn more and understand why, so we could bottle lightning!
Martina King and Jennifer Long hired two Makerspace regulars (MacEwan undergraduate students) as student researchers. These students conducted ethnography (participant observation and collecting interviews) with four other space users. This report provides an overview of our team’s findings and a list of recommendations for the 2023-2024 school year. Members of the research team also wrote speculative fictions about what the future of MacEwan’s Makerspace *could* be.
Who uses the makerspace, and why?
Who uses the makerspace, and why?
This pilot study found that the Makerspace was a place that engendered creativity. This was also a space where creative minds were able to build deeper relationships through shared passions around crafting, building, and ‘nerd culture’. First time users of the space would often enter the Makerspace for a school-related project. Those who tended to return, did so to make and create for a personal project. Of the four individuals, and tens of hours of participant observation conducted, the researchers noted that Makerspace students used the 3D printers the most, while the tools associated with textiles and Arduino did not receive the same amount of attention or use.
Drawing in Creative Minds
Drawing in Creative Minds
The Makerspace appealed to various student interests including pop culture, entreprenuership, tech, and student life & work.
Tech Tutors
Tech Tutors
The Makerspace at MacEwan hires undergraduate students as Tech Tutors. Their job is to welcome and orient users to the space, provide safety and training using equipment, tools, and software, and support users with troubleshooting. We found that staff experts welcomed new space users and equipped them to carry out independent projects, which meant better use of the space. These individuals were seen as a fixture of the Makerspace and an important facet of what made its users embrace the space.
Free and Fixed Use
Free and Fixed Use
The research team identified ‘mixed programming’ as the best way to encourage a variety of MacEwan students to use the Makerspace. We define mixed programming as having dedicated ‘free use’ or ‘scheduled use’ periods (for example, by SAMU clubs). The fact that students did not have to pay to use the space and were encouraged to ‘get hands-on’ with the tools, were significant draws.
Makerspace as a Safe Space?
Makerspace as a Safe Space?
The Makerspace was experienced as a friendly, diverse, and welcoming space. Although it does not have an official designation of a Safe Space on campus. Interview participants highlighted the meaningful action taken by the Tech Tutors (by calling out the action in real time) and the Library staff (following up and taking things through official channels if necessary) if/when harmful, biased, or exclusionary acts were committed.
Community Report
Community Report
Download our community report below. You can find out more about what students said about using the Makerspace, the recommendations, and read six speculative fiction stories from Martina, Liam, and Kaeli-Rae.
Some of our recommendations included:
Build on our ‘Maker Persona’:
Incorporate more ‘how to sessions’ around well-used (3D printers) and not-as-well used tools (textiles, embroidery, silk screening, etc.).
Build Makers’ capacity (e.g., paint for 3D prints, regularly clearing SD cards to increase capacity, access to a sink or resin printer).
Invest in a bigger Makerspace (ONE SPACE TO RULE THEM ALLLLL!!!!).
Incorporate Systematic ways to Foster a ‘Makers Network’
Invest in training of all staff to ensure consistency and make the Makerspace a stated safe space on campus.
Explore methods of lending out high risk (i.e., high cost/high reward tools).
Invest in a means to better showcase items crafted in the space.
Incorporate new programs and planning for short, medium, and large projects related to both school and personal interests.
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