NCSU Libraries Makerspace Offers CRDM Graduate Research Assistantship

CHASS PhD students to get experience with emerging maker technologies

This new NCSU Libraries CRDM Graduate Research Assistantship offers graduate students the opportunity to collaborate with skilled information professionals to gain experience providing technology services in an academic setting. The access to spaces and service programs, with an emphasis on emerging technologies, is designed to enhance graduate student education through practical assignments that introduce participants to key issues and practices in educational technology.

Jessica Handloff, the first recipient of the assistantship, is a U.S. Army Captain and comes to NC State most recently from East Carolina University, where she received a Masters in Anthropology.

According to Adam Rogers, Emerging Technology Services Librarian, "Jessica has already established herself as a crucial member of the D. H. Hill Jr. Makerspace team. She has enriched the Makerspace with excellently designed learning resources, supported students and faculty in learning the processes and tools of making in innovative ways, and identified great opportunities for collaboration with her CRDM cohort and its faculty. I look forward to her contributions in the coming year and know they will do a lot to establish the Hill Makerspace as a premiere space for critical and creative thinking and making on campus."

Makerspace
The Libraries opened its first Makerspace in January 2013 with the opening of Hunt Library, making new tools accessible to users at NC State University and taking a leadership role in the growing movement for makerspaces in libraries. The Makerspace program includes 3D printing and laser cutting services, a variety of methods of 3D scanning, electronics prototyping kits to borrow, and a series of workshops and course collaborations that has grown each semester. These efforts have brought the Maker movement into the Libraries and grown its profile on campus by providing access to exciting high-end tools as well as entry-level learning and making experiences to all students, faculty, and staff.

This past June, the D. H. Hill Library opened its Makerspace. A major addition to the Makerspace program, and to the Libraries as a whole, this high-profile location provides ample space for collaborative work and teaching and is well situated to empower more of the NC State community with the creative tools and processes of making. In this space, the Libraries continues to focus on 3D printing and scanning, laser cutting, and electronics prototyping, while adding new tools such as sewing and soldering and emphasizing hands-on access. The NCSU Libraries has a full slate of programming, workshops, presentations, and opportunities for serendipitous making already in the works.