Wednesday, April 18, 2018

In 2016, The Citadel began initial plans to develop a campus- wide makerspace, where students, faculty, and staff could explore interdisciplinary collaboration and emerging technologies in an accessible, dynamic environment. Turkewitz covers the challenges and creative solutions encountered when establishing the makerspace. Principled leadership is a core focus, and the makerspace was developed with these important pillars in mind: prepare, engage, serve, and lead. Decisions on the location, purpose, and mission of the makerspace emerged from this core focus and guided purchasing choices, service model, workshop plans, and outreach efforts to the campus and the Charleston community. Gain insights and ideas! Woodall discusses how the SU Libraries integrated virtual reality (VR) into its makerspace with an HTC Vive and offers suggestions for those looking to offer this exciting new technology to their own patrons. Whether you already have a makerspace or you are just starting to think about creating one, he gives you the tools you need to decide whether VR equipment will work for your space, what policies you should have to ensure your users and equipment stay safe, and how to set everything up so that it works reliably. You also hear about what didn’t work for the SU Libraries MakerLab, so you can avoid the same mistakes!