Vulca Seminar 2023 | Learning Networks

Vulca Seminar 2023 | Learning Networks

About Vulca Seminar Vulca Seminars were created as a following step of Vulca Tours, enabling the makers’ community to interconnect with each other, deepening the sense of belonging to the community VULCA is developing. Through Seminars, we want to emphasise different makers’ communities in Europe. Each year, our seminar is organised in a different place and country in Europe, and topics are adapted based on key efforts of the welcoming community. Seminars are open to everyone who thinks the maker movement makes a positive impact and we want to encourage everyone (makers, hackers, researchers, …) to meet and discuss with each other. 6th EDITION (already) Previous editions of VULCA Seminar brought us to several European countries such as France, Poland or Portugal. In 2023 VULCA community will be reunited in Ljubljana, Slovenia. We visited Slovenia in 2017, meeting Kreator Lab in Maribor, and then Zavod 404, Poligon and Rog Lab in Ljubljana. Years after, we kept relations with some of them through different projects and events. 2023 is the right moment to organise something together, and the new CENTER...
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Critical Making Mentoring Program 2022 in Review

Critical Making Mentoring Program 2022 in Review

By Melanie Chan Comment Closed
As part of the H2020-funded Critical Making project, we embarked on a series of initiatives that resulted in various interactive tools and literature tailor-made for academia, practitioners, and educators. A true gem among these initiatives was the Critical Making Mentoring Programme, a remarkable 9-month journey where makers received invaluable guidance from a group of esteemed mentors. They include Saad Chinoy, Co-Founder of SpudnikLab; Georgia Nicolau, Founder of Instituto Procomum; Bahar Kumar, Strategic Advisor at Communitere; Emilio Velis, Executive Director of Appropedia Foundation, and Aravinth Panch, Co-Director of DreamSpace Academy. We're thrilled to bring you the exciting highlights of the mentoring program and our talented mentees' inspiring experiences. Together, they explored the fundamental principles of the critical making framework in open science hardware, social innovation, and environmental sustainability. Our program welcomed 13 ambitious mentees from around the globe, including Brazil, Ecuador, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Iraq, and beyond! It was a meaningful co-learning experience where mentees gathered online to share their visions of addressing specific...
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GIG | MTM Meet the Member

GIG | MTM Meet the Member

Meet the Members is a come together where new members introduce themselves to the Network, and older members also get to introduce themselves and exchange knowledge and experiences. It is an opportunity that is open to all members in order to have the chance tell their latest updates, ask for support, laugh and exchange on so many levels - as if it was a hanging out on the banks of the Spree river in Berlin. Happening every last Wednesday of every month. Note: Links to this zoom meeting are shared timely before the event. ...
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Announcing “GIG supports project Tolocar” to connect with Ukrainian makers.

Announcing “GIG supports project Tolocar” to connect with Ukrainian makers.

By Mugethi Gitau Comment Closed
The HIWW Truck English version [Ukrainian Version below] When faced with challenges or adversity way beyond what a person can handle - one of the cultural responses in Ukraine is “Toloka”. Turning to the crowd for support. Providing solutions at the needed scale, and with ingenuity and insight beyond what an individual can muster. tolocar.org The Tolocar project was created to support makers in Ukraine in an extremely difficult situation. It provides Ukrainian makers with access to international maker communities and creates a sustainable exchange network between Ukrainian and international producers.  To support and strengthen Ukraine's industries, partners from around the world have come together to implement various projects on reconstruction and rehabilitation, open production, knowledge transfer and innovation. In the spring of 2022, the Tolocar project began sending converted workshop vans to Ukraine, which have the capabilities of a mobile makerspace or fablab on wheels. These open mobile production facilities are designed to support humanitarian activities in the country. the Cadus Supporter They provide high-tech manufacturing or...
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Sailing on Knowledge Waves

Sailing on Knowledge Waves

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
In 2014, Nave à Vela - a start-up co-founded by GIG member Miguel Chaves in Brazil - has the purpose of, in partnership with schools, building a more meaningful education, promoting increasingly innovative teaching, and respecting the particularities and reality of each school. The mission is to transform schools into places where students' creativity and curiosity awake. They develop activities encouraging them to build knowledge through practices, projects and even life purposes. The Curricular Base for Innovation Culture: a methodology fostering student's development. Nave à Vela (NAV) respects the needs of each school and its particularities. For this reason, it developed an adaptable methodology to fit each school's needs: the Curricular Base for a Culture of Innovation. Designed for kindergarten, elementary school and high school students, it promotes maker learning, in which the student learns by building toys and prototypes and authoring projects. In this process, he starts to have a more exploratory relationship with knowledge and, thus, develops his autonomy. By becoming...
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MEET THE MEMBERS meets its Counterpart in Germany

MEET THE MEMBERS meets its Counterpart in Germany

Next MEET THE MEMBERS is planned as usual on the last of Wednesday of the month - November 30th at 14:00 CET. This next one, we will have special guests that are not members per se. Our MEET THE MEMBERS will be combined with its parallel in Germany 'MEET AND CHAT'  , the monthly gathering of makers from Offene WerkStätten (Open Workshops). Open Workshops Germany is an offspring network of our newly joined Supporting Member, Anstiftung who will be there to introduce themselves as well. We want to connect GIGer maker spaces to maker spaces in Germany and explore possibilities together; whether you are a maker space or not, I would say this  ONE is not to be missed! Global Innovation Gathering (GIG) is a vibrant, diverse community of innovation hubs, makerspaces, hackerspaces and other grassroots innovation community spaces alongside individual innovators, makers, technologists and changemaker. MEET THE MEMBERS (MTM) is an online community event that takes place on the last Wednesday of each...
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H-Fablab – Fuelling sustainable innovative solutions in Côte d’Ivoire;  starting with young makers

H-Fablab – Fuelling sustainable innovative solutions in Côte d’Ivoire;  starting with young makers

By Mugethi Gitau Comment Closed
Dodji Honou conducting a practical training for kids at H-Fablab (all photos courtesy of H-Fablab) In the neighborhood of Bingerville about 45 minutes -1 hour from Abidjan, in the district of Angré,  stands H-FABLAB.  A digital manufacturing laboratory whose primary objective is to promote learning by doing among young people, whether or not in school, literate or not in French. The space was opened formally  in Sep 2021, but had been running informally for 2 years before that. They enjoy good internet access via a fiber connection, though electricity can be sometimes unstable Dodji Honou is  the founder of H-Fablab. His story begins in Togo, where he was born. And where his story with makerspaces  and innovation hubs began. He was a member of  Woelab now expanded into Hubcity in Togo, and in 2013 while there, his story with GIG also began. He met GIGers, Geraldine and Max , who introduced him to GIG.  He later moved on to Senegal to work with a...
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Please, Make things that Make sense!

Please, Make things that Make sense!

By Ricardo Ruiz Comment Closed
We are inviting makers & innovators globally to take part in the journey toward shaping a sustainable future of making.  Critical Making mentoring programme takes a deep dive into its principles:  Make Things That Make Sense: Create products and solutions that solve fundamental, real-world problems. Share How You Make: Develop guidelines that provide a framework for openly documenting everything about the project's making. Include Ecosystem Services: Aim to give back more than you take from the environment and include accounting practices that value natural resources. Integrate Local Knowledge: Build from within the community by working with local methods, materials and traditional resources. Build for Continuity: Design for the present and future; build social capacity, & aim for financial self-sufficiency.  Powering Inclusion and Openness. Critical Making adds scientific insights into the potential of the maker movement. Socially responsible making can show how global maker communities can offer new opportunities. Opportunities for young talents of all genders to contribute to an open society via open source innovation. You can learn more about...
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Maker Faire Cairo 2022

Maker Faire Cairo 2022

Maker Faire Cairo is back offline! Maker Faire is a gathering of fascinating, curious people who enjoy learning and love sharing what they can do. Maker Faire is a venue for these "makers" to show hobbies, experiments, and projects, from engineers to artists to scientists to crafters. It is called the Greatest Show (& Tell) on Earth - a family-friendly showcase of invention, creativity, and resourcefulness. Join the event as a maker through their call for makers: cairo.makerfaire.com/call-for-makers/ Stay tuned for more details about the programme and location of the event! Meanwhile, find more information, including videos of previous Makerfaires here ...
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CRITICAL MAKING mentoring kick-off & workshop on “Make Things That Make Sense” with Saad Chinoy

CRITICAL MAKING mentoring kick-off & workshop on “Make Things That Make Sense” with Saad Chinoy

How can you advance your product innovation based on openness and critical thinking? We are inviting makers & innovators globally to take part in the journey towards shaping a sustainable future of making. During the last months we have co-designed, conceptualized, invited, wrote, spoke, managed, ... with and for you all a Critical Making mentoring programme to take a deep dive into the principles that informed the creating of this project: Make Things That Make Sense: Create products and solutions that solve fundamental, real-world problems.Share How You Make: Develop a set of guidelines that provide a framework for openly documenting everything about the making of the project.Include Ecosystem Services: Aim to give back more than you take from the environment and include accounting practices that value the natural resources used.Integrate Local Knowledge: Build from within the community by working with local practices, materials and traditional resources.Build for Continuity: Design for the present and future; build social capacity, & aim for financial self sufficiency. We...
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