Back in June last year I ended up at a meeting organised by a principal lecturer and biologist from LJMU, Mark Feltham. He wanted to meet the “makers” in the University and start a working group, the Maker Education Working Group- a bit of a mouthful so officially we’re MEWG but generally we go by the name HEdWorks; a project that Mark set up a few years prior for teaching Science undergraduates via social media and Maker Education, (tres creative!).
15 of us (academics) signed up to join the group on the day, presently there is a core (highly active) board- Mark’s the chair and founder, then there’s Caroline Keep, co-founder, Brett Lempereur, a project lead, David Llewellyn-Jones and myself as technical leads. In the past twelve months (OMG, ‘we’ are nearly 1! Party?) HEdWorks (Higher Education Works, that is BTW!) has grown, ~30 members and ~nine partners across LJMU and the Merseyside region (schools, studios, businesses, technologists, makers, innovators, educators). Many of the members are and have been involved in a variety of fundraising activities, exhibitions and events, all focusing on a “Maker Ethos“.
You can read more about HEdWorks on the website – http://makerED.WTF (We Teach FUN!). You can also reach out to us all via twitter: @HEdWorks, @MarkFeltham666, @Ka81, @BrettLempereur, @flypigahoy and @SayBeano.
Yesterday I presented about what HEdWorks have been up to, inside and outside of the University- I didn’t have the time to cover everything, but I covered a fair chunk of it and I also gave a brief special mention of our next event that’s been funded and organised by a spin off committee (Special props to the Awesome Liverpool Foundation while we’re here.), Liverpool Make Fest 2015, which happens THIS Saturday at Liverpool Central Library. You can check out the website here, http://lpoolmakefest.wordpress.com or you can just come along, it’s going to be amazingly amazingly amazing for everyone who’s got even a little bit of geek in them 😉
The presentation I gave is available to download/view in a browser here:
Creating a university makerspace
If you want to join MEWG and get access to the mailing list, please complete the form here:
Finally, thanks for reading and come say hello during Make Fest if you see us!