America has always been a nation of tinkerers, inventors, and entrepreneurs. In recent years, the rise of the maker movement and growing community of self-identified makers have come to represent a huge opportunity for the United States. In the same way that the Internet and cloud computing have lowered the barriers to entry for digital startups, the democratization of the tools needed to design and prototype physical products can support entrepreneurship and a renaissance of American manufacturing.Tools such as 3D printers ...
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America has always been a nation of tinkerers, inventors, and entrepreneurs. In recent years, the rise of the maker movement and growing community of self-identified makers have come to represent a huge opportunity for the United States. In the same way that the Internet and cloud computing have lowered the barriers to entry for digital startups, the democratization of the tools needed to design and prototype physical products can support entrepreneurship and a renaissance of American manufacturing.Tools such as 3D printers, desktop machine tools, and tools for digital design are becoming more powerful, less expensive, easier to use, and more widely available through shared spaces. These trends, when combined with crowdfunding and online communities of practice, are empowering tinkerers, entrepreneurs, and companies to transform an idea from a drawing on the back of a napkin to a working prototype faster than ever before.Public and private investments focused on increasing access to modern tools, shared facilities, and manufacturing-specific curricula will contribute to the right conditions for even more entrepreneurs to join a renaissance of American manufacturing and hardware innovation.At its core, making involves higher-order reasoning and problem-solving skills as well as individual and collaborative project-based learning, all of which instill the employability and technical skills that are needed in tomorrow's workplace. Additionally, the "maker mindset" actively fosters dispositions and skills which have inherent value, such as curiosity, collaborative problem-solving, and self-efficacy. By helping students experience hands-on science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) learning and real-world problem solving, making can spark deep interest and develop the necessary passion for students to excel in the 21st century.
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