[dorkbotsea-blabber] Re: [mad_scientist] Re: Some kind of club for Bates Technical College

[Steve Greenfield]

The next quarter at Bates Technical College starts next Wednesday, so I think it is time for me to move forward with this. Here is the email I sent to the Club Contact at Bates:

*******************************
My name is Steve Greenfield. We spoke about possibly restarting the
erstwhile EiP (Engineers in Progress) club, you suggested I wait until
Fall quarter since many students take summer quarter off or at least
aren't interested in school activities over the summer.

I'm thinking of starting a different club, a club not limited to engineers. A club about making things.

"3D Garage Prototyping"
or possibly "Maker's Club"
Building desktop machinery specific to making prototypes at home. 3D
printers, desktop CNC, PCB printers. Skills from mechanical and
electronic/electrical engineering, industrial electronics, machining,
soldering, programming, use of 3D CAD tools. Some machinery might be
built by re-purposing existing equipment, for instance a 3D printer
might be built adding on to a printer, a PCB printer built by modifying
an existing printer to accept blank copper coated board, or other
equipment such as a CNC machine built from scratch.

I have an important question: if a club builds things, who owns them? I
am expecting that the raw parts will come from a combination of donated
items, parts, and materials from members, and from the up-to $500 that
Bates offers to qualifying clubs. Will the items belong to Bates, then,
or is it up to the club to decide who has ownership?

Are there any sample club charters which I can look over and use as a guide?

Thank you,
Steve Greenfield
Electronic Engineering Technician student, Dec '07 to Nov '09
Stan Reed's class, downtown campus
*******************************

As you can see, Gary, I took what you said to heart. The question of ownership is an important one that will have to be resolved before anything is built.

Questions, comments? I do intend to ask about non-students being members. I can guess that we'll need a minimum of six Bates students even if non-students are allowed to join.

Anyone know the status of Tacoma Dorkbot?

Steve Greenfield



----- Original Message ----
From: garydeal <garydeal at ucom.net>
To: mad_scientist at yahoogroups.com

Regarding the club, I'd probably lean toward something simple and 
un-frilly like "Makers". That's what you're hoping to get into the group, 
isn't it? Makers?

>The most that Bates will give to a club is $500, ...

If the school supplies money, do they also demand ownership of 
anything valuable that the club designs? That is, if the club designs and 
prototypes a working multi-million dollar product, does the school own it?

As far as the resume goes, yeah, actually producing something that 
works counts for a lot for most people. For me, pushing limits and 
getting it accomplished with perseverance, ingenuity, and only using 
random scrap counts for a lot as well. Things like "over-unity" only 
count if you've made them work (requires talent). I suppose it all 
depends on the field you want to move into and the sort of person that 
will be reading the resume.