Interns Able to Visit Local Makerspaces

Monumental Impact took on five high school students as interns at the beginning of the summer of 2021, with four focused on engineering one on journalism. Each engineering intern was tasked with coming up with and designing a product, service, or event content by the end of the summer.

At the beginning of the summer, Monumental Impact went to four different makerspaces to inspire the interns, show them real workspaces in the engineering and design fields, and give them the opportunity to learn from experts in these fields. We visited Pikes Peak Makerspace, the Manitou Art Center, Library 21c at Chapel Hills, and the ConcealFab corporation.

At each location, staff members generously gave us a tour of the facility. Our interns were able to speak directly with makers about their own experiences and knowledge and also their individual projects in order to receive advice from the experts!

Pikes Peak Makerspace

The first makerspace Monumental Impact visited was the Pikes Peak Makerspace in Colorado Springs. This organization is a non-profit that provides classes and equipment for its members to create just about anything they come up with!

Makers took us on a tour of the facility and showed us what they were making before sitting down with our interns to discuss their ideas. Our interns received some great information and constructive criticism!

“The advice they gave was kind of just going for it. You’ll never know if it’ll work until you try it. They also talked about how they’ve experienced lots of failures and how failure is a good building block, so instead of thinking of it as a setback, it’s something you can do correctly in the future. Just talking about that really helped me understand that the kit didn’t have to work out the first time,” said Bailey Gargasz.

Thank you to Pikes Peak Makerspace for welcoming our interns into their facility and teaching them more about the design and creation process!

Manitou Art Center

MITEE visited the Manitou Art Center next, and it was amazing! The art center is a non-profit that is home to just about every artistic field you can think of: everything from ceramics to metal-working to making textiles or electronics. 

Three artists who create their work at the art center presented some of their artwork to us, discussing everything from their creation process to how they find inspiration for their art to marketing. Our interns learned a ton about the design process from those at the makerspace.

Artists are able to rent out spaces to create their art, and the art center’s equipment is also available to the public! Manitou Art Center has partnered with the Pikes Peak Library District (PPLD) to allow cardholders to access the makerspace during open hours, so it is an amazing place to learn or foster new artistic talents.

During our tour, it was inspiring to see all of the different artistic fields with beautiful creations scattered throughout. Our interns loved seeing an art-focused makerspace, and are excited to approach their projects with creativity and a new lens!

Library 21c

For our third visit to makerspaces in the region, Monumental Impact went to Library 21C!

During our tour, we saw all of the equipment open to PPLD cardholders: 3D printers, wood engravers, a dark room, a video and music studio, computers with the full Adobe suite, and more!

We had a ton of fun touring the library and working on our projects in one of the conference rooms. Thank you, Library 21c, for hosting us!

ConcealFab Corporation

For our final visit to a makerspace for the semester, we went to the ConcealFab Corporation in Colorado Springs!

In this facility, our interns were able to see the production process of small cell concealments for hybrid spectrum radios and antennas. The final product is sleek, and the company’s goal is to both help the customers achieve faster site approval and improve wireless network performance. 

It was incredible to tour through the various stages of production, with Carl Tompson, the Vice President of Engineering, as our tour guide. The tour made our interns think about options for producing their own products on a larger scale.

William “Doc” Pounds, Executive Vice President – Technical Fellow, spoke with our interns about his experience in the engineering field. With 40 years of experience in conceptual and electro-mechanical design, he was an amazing resource for our interns.

“I really liked ConcealFab with Doc. Doc was awesome, he was super nice and he also showed us a bunch of cool stuff, it was really interesting,” said Bailey Gargasz.

Thank you to ConcealFab for helping to inspire our interns to take their products as far as possible!

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