Hands-on learning, tools allow dreamers to become makers
Oklahoma is uniquely positioned to leverage the emerging creative revolution because the state’s two-year technology schools are well-funded and focused on hands-on learning, TechShop CEO Mark Hatch said during an event at Francis Tuttle Technology Center.
Hatch, a leader of the Maker Movement, spoke Thursday with educators, business leaders and state officials at the event that featured projects by Oklahoma CareerTech students from across the state.
“We are moving into an era of the most innovation, entrepreneurship and creativity in all of human history,” Hatch said. “The tools of the industrial revolution are now easy to use, incredibly powerful and very cheap.
“If we reintroduce hands-on learning inside the schools — which is what CareerTech does particularly well — I believe we will raise an entire generation of makers. We are the best hope for solving the world’s problems.”
The key is giving people access to the tools they need to turn their dreams into reality, he said.
Each of his eight TechShop locations is a do-it-yourself fabrication studio with “every tool you need to make anything on the planet.”
Members pay $150 per month and a fee for classes to learn how to operate the tools safely.
“If you can think it, you can make it,” Hatch said. “And that is new to the world.”
Learning by doing
Students from Tuttle Middle School were among those showcasing their projects at the event. They are part of the U-Learn Academy at Canadian Valley Technology Center, where Don Wilson is coordinator of educational technology.
“The students learn by doing on their own. It’s hands-on, student-centered, self-selected type projects,” Wilson said.
“There’s really no other real way to learn. If you don’t actually get hands-on with something, you might put it into memory for a little while, but I don’t know that you’ve actually learned it.”
Letting a student choose a project that relates to their life keeps them engaged and allows them to take control of their own learning, Wilson said. The process teaches them persistence and problem-solving, he said.
At the Moore-Norman Technology Center display, Kevin Darrow demonstrated virtual welding equipment that lets students practice skills and gives them instant feedback.
Darrow, a Norman North High School student, learned about the welding program during a tour of the technology center and decided to give it a try.
Now he wants to work as a pipeliner in the oil and gas industry.
Welding instructor Joshua Younger said welders can find good jobs in a number of industries, including construction, heating and air conditioning, plumbing and aircraft maintenance. Tinker Air Force Base was advertising for 11 welders Thursday, he said.
Creating success
Gov. Mary Fallin — who invited Hatch to speak — said access to a TechShop setting could help Oklahomans use their talents and skills to develop companies and create jobs here.
“We’re about innovation. We’re about entrepreneurship,” Fallin said. “I would love to have several of these innovation centers.”
Hatch said the economic impact on California from the three Bay-area shops is 2,000 jobs, $200 million in annual salaries and $20 million in annual income tax.
It starts with engaging students in hands-on learning “very early on,” he said, and continues with providing them the tools that let them apply what they’ve learned.
At his shops, anyone can access 3D printers, water jets, software and electronics, metal and woodworking tools, sewing machines and much more.
Software to control machines is getting easier and easier to use, Hatch said.
“The laser cutter is powerful and incredibly easy to use,” he said. “We routinely see people take this $75 (laser cutter) class and launch a business in weeks — not months, not years.”
Hatch highlighted a number of TechShop member success stories. One member built the world’s fastest electric motorcycle from the ground up; another launched an underwater robot company after nine months; a third was on “Shark Tank” and all five investors competed to finance his idea.
“Right here on this campus, these kids have the skill they need to do this kind of thing. All they’re lacking right now is access,” Hatch said. “Access to tools is absolutely everything.”
The invention he called his “favorite by far” is the Embrace Warmer, a portable incubator blanket developed by Jane Chen and her team. It started as a class project at Stanford University to develop a way to keep premature newborns in developing countries warm long enough to get to a hospital.
“It already has saved 200,000 babies around the world,” Hatch said.