As we continue on with our blog series on tips for building and operating a makerspace, we’re tackling a broad topic that ultimately determines the success and longevity of your makerspace: management.
Makerspace management is something that should be debated and solidified before you even build out your space. You need a solid plan of action so that everyone involved is in agreement before you open the doors for student use. These are some of the top things to consider when planning how to manage your makerspace.
Determine Who Will Manage Your Makerspace
Will your makerspace be student-led, faculty-led, or operated by specialty staff? Or a combination of all of these?
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At the community college and university level we often see faculty empowering students to manage their makerspaces and innovation labs. For example, The University of Maryland Startup Shell is a student-run co-working space and incubator that helps students bring their ideas to life and get their companies off the ground. The UMD Startup Shell is located just next to the school’s MakerBot Innovation Center and Rapid Prototyping Labs. While university faculty ultimately have final sign-off on equipment purchases, students operate these labs too — as part-time university employees.
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Whether your space will be managed by students or staff, it’s important to make sure you have enough dedicated individuals with the knowledge and experience to ensure equipment continues to run properly, users are sufficiently trained on equipment use, users can use the equipment they need to in a timely fashion, and jobs are managed in an organized manner.
Understand Maintenance Needs for Every System
All of the technologies you bring into your space will require you to perform some level of maintenance. You should be aware of the maintenance requirements for each piece of equipment in your space so you can plan to properly maintain them from day one.
For example, you’ll be responsible for daily maintenance like keeping the inside of your 3D printer clean or keeping the optics in your laser cutter clean, and your reseller or service provider will likely be responsible for any maintenance required when your systems break.
Establish A Process for Warranties and System Repairs
When equipment under warranty needs to be repaired, will you have a single customer service line to call? Or will you need to call different manufacturers for each piece of equipment?
It’s important to know the policies of your provider so that you can clearly communicate to users how long a piece of equipment may be temporarily out-of-service. Equally as important is to determine who from your team will be responsible for taking care of ongoing maintenance as well as scheduling system repairs when equipment breaks. A solid plan of action will ensure the least amount of downtime so users can continue creating and making.
Know the Diversity of Your User Base
Are your users beginners, intermediate, advanced, or a combination? You will need to offer some sort of onboarding training and/or regular workshops to ensure users know how to make the most of the technologies available to them.
Decide How You Will Manage Users Time
Display a timer on the board so students can see how long their working period is. I’ve found that using a timer helps students stay on task and attend to their projects.
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Inventory Material Usage
Especially for larger makerspaces in which there are multiple jobs running at any given point, it’s important to set up an organized consumables inventory so that you have a full understanding of how much of each different type of material is used. This will ensure you can replenish materials as needed and will also help you track costs associated with consumables.
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Some smaller K12 or library makerspaces opt to have more control and limit amount of materials that can be out at once. For example, if students are making a project that involve 3D printed parts, laser cut acrylic, rubber bands, and paint, you may want to pre-portion the materials for the project or gradually distribute the materials, limiting the amount used at one time.
You can learn more about managing a makerspace (including makerspace design, budgeting, and detailed equipment requirements) in our Makerspace Checklist. Download it for FREE here.
