We are very excited to announce Maker Ed’s 5th cohort of Making Spaces Hubs! These 5 hubs—including 3 community makerspaces, a museum, and a university—are joining this 30-month professional learning and capacity-building program designed to develop local leadership around maker-centered learning and build a foundation to embed change in three core areas (pedagogy, community, and culture) while emphasizing sustainability and growth.

We are grateful to Cognizant’s Making the Future initiative for generously offering five (5) scholarships of $20,000 each outstanding Making Spaces organizations in a competitive grant process. The scholarship covers the membership fee of $15,000 with an additional $5,000 to support the work in building your community network.

And without further ado, the fifth cohort of Making Spaces:

The 29th Street Community Center (Strong City Baltimore)

Baltimore, MD

The 29th Street Community Center is a story of renewal and civic engagement. Built-in 1979 and attached to Barclay Elementary/Middle School on the 300 block of East 29th Street, was slated to be closed by the Baltimore City Department of Recreation and Parks in 2011, leaving the once-thriving community space vacant. Since its rebirth, The Center has offered over 65 unique and diverse programs, dozens of community-strengthening events, and essential public services to thousands of community residents of all ages and socio-economic backgrounds. All programming opportunities at The Center are designed to be a safe place for all and to provide access to unique, enriching experiences that promote community connection.

AIMS Center for Math and Science Education

Fresno, CA

AIMS is a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing playful, hands-on, and creative approaches to teaching and learning mathematics and science through professional development, learning partnerships, and community engagement. With over 30 years of experience in PK-12 STEM education, AIMS helps educators design rich and engaging learning environments, provides resources to communities and families, and bridges research and practice with colloquium events and research fellowships.

Children’s Creativity Museum

San Francisco, CA

The Children’s Creativity Museum’s mission is to nurture creativity and collaboration in all children and family. Through the museum and its website (www.creativity.org), CCM provides hands-on multi-media art and technology experiences designed to build creative confidence in children ages 2-12. Some of its most popular activities at the museum include the Making Music Studio, Animation Studio, Robot Coding Lab, Mystery Box Challenge, and teamLab’s multimedia interactive exhibition, Sketchtown. Since it’s opening in 1998 in the Yerba Buena Gardens in the SOMA neighborhood of San Francisco, the Children’s Creativity Museum has served over 1.2M visitors.

VT-DC STEM Labs

Falls Church, VA

The Virginia Tech Washington, D.C. Metro Area K-20 STEM Education and Workforce Development Labs (VT-DC STEM Labs) team serves over 4000 school-aged students, teachers, administrators, parents, and collaborators annually in Virginia, Washington, D.C., Maryland, and the Eastern Panhandle of West Virginia, but we also work with educators throughout the U.S. and internationally. Visitors participate in technical career and college exploration and hands-on STEM/STEAM activities that provide the exposures and experiences necessary for student resilience in pursuing their vision of themselves.

Our programs’ outreach is to under-resourced schools serving diverse communities. Our efforts also emphasize outreach to under-resourced families and especially prospective first-generation college attendees. Similarly, our teacher professional development programs and school-based Labs are designed to promote equitable opportunities and inclusion of diverse students in technical careers and college majors.

Imagine Foundry

Cookeville, TN

Imagine Foundry is a nonprofit 501c3 educational organization with a makerspace and programs designed to foster positive social change. We do that by enriching our youth and their families with knowledge and skills needed to be contributing citizens in the community. Imagine Foundry is a place for families to:

• imagine and be innovative
• design and create their inventions
• access experts and professionals
• find their passion & develop grit
• share and collaborate with others

Overview of Making Spaces Partners and Sponsors

Making Spaces is led by Maker Ed with evaluation support from by the Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh (CMP).  The National Making Spaces program began in 2016 with funding from Google as a partnership between Maker Ed and CMP, based on a 2015 pilot run by CMP and Kickstarter called Kickstarting Making in Schools. We are excited by the continued programmatic support from Google and that all 5 of our hubs are generously sponsored by Cognizant’s Making the Future initiative.

Maker Ed

The Maker Education Initiative (Maker Ed), a 501(c)(3) non-profit, aims to transform teaching and learning through the power of making. By offering blended in-person and online professional development for educators and other champions, and by building a national community of practitioners dedicated to the work, Maker Ed aims to create educational environments of all types that are boisterous and equitable, teeming with visible proof of growth in every young learner. Maker Ed plays a national leadership role in both broadening access to and deepening the impact of maker education for youth. Join us in building a more just education system https://makered.org/get-involved/donate/

Cognizant

Cognizant’s Making the Future investment in Making Spaces will grow and strengthen the ecosystems necessary to geographically scale and advance maker-centered learning to serve as a catalyst for life-long learning, a future-ready workforce and an equitable and inclusive society.

Google’s Making & Science

Making & Science is an initiative from Google to inspire future scientists and makers. Learn more about our programs, events, media, and the new Science Journal app at makingscience.withgoogle.com.

Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh

Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh welcomes more than 306,000 visitors annually and provides “real stuff” experiences for joy, creativity and curiosity. The Museum’s permanent exhibit MAKESHOP® was built in 2011 to create a space for children and families to make, play and design using the same materials, tools and processes used by professional artists, builders, programmers and creators of all kinds. The Museum’s maker-focused initiatives include serving as a the host site for Maker Educator Boot Camp, Youth maker workshops and after-school program, an arts and making festival, STEAM Carnival in 2019, and much more.

In April 2019, Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh opened Museum Lab as a place where kids 10+ can have cutting-edge experiences in art, tech and making and expanding the CMP campus to become the largest cultural campus for children in the country. In the historic 1890 Carnegie Library, Museum Lab serves as a platform for innovations in learning at the crossroads of school and museum. It contains art, making and digital media laboratories for use by visitors and multiple partners including a school for 120 middle school students. For more information, visit www.pittsburghkids.org and follow @pghkids.