Danielle Martin

Joined almost 7 years ago.
Bio

As co-author of Start Making! A Guide to Engaging Young People in Maker Activities, I share over 17 years of passion for instructional design, youth development, tech & media education and community organizing. Today, I’m a lead consultant on part of the new Fab Foundation SCOPES-df (Scaling a Community of Practice for Education in STEM through Digital Fabrication) project to to build a grassroots bank of expertise to empower young learners in utilizing digital fabrication tools to explore STEM pursuits in K-12 spaces. The project aims to collect and share a set of high quality digital fabrication learning plans aligned to national and/or international educational standards - stay tuned for the open call now for contribution in late April 2017! Previously, I led corporate volunteer projects to integrate technology in schools in developing countries with the ed-tech startup Team4Tech, after I managed knowledge for over 4 years for the global Clubhouse Network. It’s there that I led Start Making!, an effort to infuse inclusive hands-on engineering in nearly 100 Clubhouses in 20 countries. My roots in informal education and activism were seeded as a local coordinator at the Boys & Girls Clubs of Boston, Charlestown Computer Clubhouse, then serving as an AmeriCorps VISTA. I later co-created MIT’s Center for Civic Media, Department of Play, mapping mobile technologies and youth activism methodologies globally. I hold a BA in Communication Studies from URI and a Master in City Planning from MIT. I started making by collaging in early Photoshop and hacking Polaroids but now enjoy Instagram and baking treats for anyone that will eat them.

In school, I was “bad at math and science,” pegged as just an artist and a storyteller. Yet, I hung around scientists, engineers, and educators, absorbing how they investigated the world. When I got a chance to teach in Computer Clubhouses, I met plenty of learners like me - told they weren’t good at STEM but were interested or building anyways. Now, I just start making! I sit down next learners and make beside them. If I joke when I fail or ask about their day, they often go deeper to share their fears and aspirations, as well as reflect on their work. I’m solely motivated to hook the most disengaged, by peaking their curiosity about new tools and building their confidence in community to learn and act using them. The best way I know how is to show up, build my own skills, then (sometimes loudly) always express my joy.

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Danielle Martin signed up
almost 7 years ago