Building Community in the Makerspace

In January 2022, a dozen students and faculty members gathered to form the Makerspace Open Hours (MSOH) group. The goal of the group was to open up Dana Hall's makerspace on weekends so that boarding and day students could use the space to work on personal projects. Given current staffing, students typically only have access to the makerspace when accompanied by a teacher and while working on class projects. The students in the MSOH group have a wide range of interests: some of them have extensive experience working with hardware, either through the Principles in Engineering course at Dana Hall or outside camps and workshops; some have more experience with arts and crafts, but are hoping to branch into electronics and robotics; while others are simply curious and looking for more creative outlets in their spare time.

A hallmark of STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education is creative problem solving. Engineers and designers apply math and science to invent, design, and build tools to solve real-world problems. Instead of seeing problems as problems, engineers and designers see problems as opportunities to grow, learn, adapt, and make even better tools and technologies. Instead of seeing the lack of staffing in the makerspace as an annoying problem to overcome, the MSOH group chose to see it as a vital opportunity to leverage.

Many of the early makerspaces took shape in someone's garage: while one person donated the space, others contributed tools, know-how, and elbow grease. After all, if I own a set of tools, I am probably only using them 5% of the time; so what if I made them available to other people the other 95% of the time? And what if, instead of charging people for access to my tools, I simply asked people to contribute to the makerspace in some way? The result was the development of a vibrant sense of community, where everyone tended to the community in order to keep it healthy and thriving.

The MSOH group decided to recreate the original ethos of a makespace and nurture the same vibrant sense of community. Sure, there would always need to be an adult on duty in the makerspace to provide adult supervision, but the MSOH group itself would supervise and train other students, maintain an inventory of supplies, keep the space clean and organized, run workshops and host activities, create and share instructional videos for cool and inventive projects, and encourage more people to use the makerspace. By nurturing a vibrant sense of community in the makerspace, where everyone contributes to the community in some way, the MSOH group hopes to make the overall sense of community at Dana Hall even stronger.

Members of the Makerspace Open Hours (MSOH) group work to take apart a computer