News

Tuesday, May 5th, marked our first-ever virtual Showcase presentation. We used Zoom to connect participants and stakeholders throughout the state. Though separated by the corona virus-pandemic, our virtual community remained strong.

On Saturday, April 18th, UTeach Maker used ZOOM to host our first-ever virtual weekend workshop. Makers and mentors spent time working together to use making as an outlet for de-stressing and focusing on self-care and health.

Tuesday, April 7th, marked our first-ever virtual cohort meeting. We used Zoom to connect participants in different parts of the city and state. Though we were physically separated, we had over 30 makers attend online showing that we are united and in need of creative outlets more than ever.

On Tuesday, March 10th, UTeach Maker visited co.lab Community Makers for our March monthly cohort meeting. Originally planned as part of a SXSWEdu meet-up, this monthly cohort meeting focused on authentic collaboration with a local makerspace that seeks to provide safe, inclusive, and free access to the tools and knowledge of making to everybody in an environment where they can thrive as creatives.

On Tuesday, February 4th, UTeach Makers paired up with students from UT's College of Fine Arts (COFA) for our first cohort meeting of Spring 2020. The focus of the event was UT Bridge Makers, a joint student-driven CNS and COFA initiative that aims to demonstrate the value of collaborative making as multidisciplinary teams design and build an interactive exhibit to be unveiled at Explore UT in March of 2020.

On Saturday, February 7th, UTeach Maker partnered with pi-top to host the first weekend workshop of the Spring semester at the UT Austin. Future teachers from UT Austin and St. Edwards University, as well as current teachers from the local area, had an opportunity to try out their coding skills. 

On Monday, May 20th, UTeach Maker hosted a Make For All meet-up to kick-off their commitment to the Make For All initiative. There were over 40 participants representing over 20 universities from UTeach replication sites. The evening began with a showcase of making that has been taking place at UT-Austin and from members of the Austin maker community. Participants had a chance to see student projects from the Step 1 final maker project and create their own UTeach Make For All button.

On Tuesday, May 7th, UTeach Maker had their monthly cohort meeting and Spring 2019 Maker Showcases. The evening kicked off with a maker playground, where participants in UTeach Maker and their mentors shared projects they have been working on. Lauren from MathHappens shared her laser-cut math manipulatives, including a new elastic Cartesian plane that folds to become a parabola. Caroline shared a dress that she sewed, plus Jean and Juliet let other play with their creation that allows students to visualize sine waves through pulleys, string, with a radian unit circle.

On Sunday, April 14th, UTeach Maker held a weekend workshop at St. Edward's University about printmaking and creating e-textiles. Our UTeach Maker Mentor, Alex Morrison, lead the workshop. The workshop kicked-off with a lesson about the history of printmaking using engravings. Participants found portraits online and then tranced the image on a sheet of paper by holding it over their laptop screen.

On Tuesday, April 2nd, UTeach Maker held our monthly cohort meeting in Painter Hall. The evening started with a Taco Tuesday dinner where UTeach Makers and Mentors has an opportunity to catch-up on recent developments and share about their experiences. The theme of the evening was cardboard and STEM. J. E. Johnson from Texas Performing Arts gave a demonstration of some student-friendly tools for cutting and shaping cardboard, such as the Dremel Moto-saw.