Tinker Lab

The Gallaudet University TinkerLab is an interdisciplinary MakerSpace outside the limitations of Program, Department or Division that houses a number of creative fabrication tools as well as a digital imaging studio, that can be used for student, faculty, and staff explorations, collaborations, research and partnerships. The lab houses different sized 3D Printers, a Laser Cutter/Engraver, CNC Routers, CNC Sewing Machines, a CNC wire bender, a 3D Magic Touch, Large Digital Drawing Tablets, Robotics Tools and Equipment, and a virtual reality space which doubles as a computer vision testing space.

The Tinkerlab is also connected to an outdoor lab (skateboard ramp/bowl) entitled the Collaborative Research-space for Art Technology Engineering and Robotics with Skateboarding (CRATERs), where experiments in gyroscopic data tracking systems attached to moving skateboards are wirelessly connected to data visualization systems in the form of graphics with light projections on an adjacent to a white wall. The CRATERs initiative was connected to a new course within Gallaudet’s Art & Media Design Program entitled “Skateboarding, Tracking & Data Visualization.” The TinkerLab has also been used for creations that would find their way into the CRATERs initiative.

The TinkerLab and CRATERs initiative has drawn attention from a number of institutes including the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) via a Space Grant written in conjunction with Gallaudet STEM and Dr. Dave Snyder, which granted operational funds to the TinkerLab and CRATERs initiative. In prior years the CRATERs initiative has received other allocations from the same foundation, as did a Robotics & Interactivity course offered within the Gallaudet Art & Media Design Program.

Separately, the CRATERs initiative along with Kazemzadeh’s “Skateboarding, Tracking & Data Visualization” course attracted attention and was included as a model of best praxis The National Academy Press (DC) “Consensus Study Report” (a book) edited by David Skorton and Ashley Bear, that highlights a number of innovative examples around the US where educators successfully merged STEM with Art education.