Does your Kid's School have a 3D Printer Yet

[Eddie]

I'm just wondering as I see and hear about schools around the world beginning to get 3D printers for their students. I'm wondering truly what percentage of schools are actually utilizing 3D printing. Anyone here have kids in school or know of schools which are already utilizing 3D printing?

[Tekcruzer]

We have 3 in our STEM classroom. I run a 3D CAD class and we also use them in our game design class.

[piraticon]

No, there are any 3D printers in my child's school. Here we have only basic computers and it's only in couple of classrooms

[ralphzoontjens]

As far as I know, only college (Dutch: HBO)/university level schools have 3D printers.
Kids I speak to do know about 3D printers. They understand how they work and soon after, they will be giving you printing assignments.
Some US secondary schools are starting with Tinkercad and 3D printing for 10-14 year olds, they have a need for educational material.

This is a good article on the topic: https://www.makershop3d.com/content/...nter-education

[xenwarps]

My kid's high school shop class just purchased a delta. Apparently they're having some trouble using it effectively though.

[cuongit]

Mission Street Manufacturing says it is already working with schools in its native California to test its new device, with hopes of persuading more to buy units when it goes on sale. For now, parents and teachers can pay $549 to secure a device from the first production run.


This being Kickstarter, there are also options to pay more: $999 for a Printeer customised with their name and choice of colour; $1,499 for a bundle of three; and $2,999 to travel to the company's office to build their own model.


"We aim to bring 3D printing to kids and schools across the globe. We are also committed to smart, sustainable growth," explains the company in its pitch.


"This is why we plan to make our first production run right here in our garage, where we can maintain a tight feedback loop between engineering and manufacturing. We sleep fifty feet from our production line."
Printeer is the first 3D printer targeted specifically at kids, although as 3D printing industry site Inside3DP points out, manufacturer 3D Systems' Cube3 printer has been marketed as a device that's accessible to children as well as adults.
Do you agree with idea from manufacturing?

[ethompson]

The local library in downtown DC has one.

[airwave]

No, and apparently not planned. Thankfully, our school uses MEL Chemistry science experiments for kids and this is a great idea, I think. I wish our school has 3D printers but they will definitely not appear in the next few years.

[curious aardvark]

unfortunately the ubiquitious 'health and safety' is what's stopping many schools getting 3d printers.

It has to be safe, it can't have any emissions, there can't be any chance for them to touch a hot part.

That limits what the school can use to a small selection. This is further reduced by having to have the machine certified and come with certain guarentees that it's kid safe, won't ever catch fire and basically has totally unrealistic expectations.

When I was scjool, we used liquid mercury in physcis experiments (I used to steal it and play with it at home).
We did sodium experiments with actual sodium in the room.

Nobody ever got hurt and we learnt a lot more.

Given how the real world actually functions - I'm not sure that the extreme coddling and lack of hands on experience, kids currently have is good for them.

I often see the phrase used: 'they promised us flying cars by 2000'.
And flying cars we have, they were a reality before 2000. But legislation and regulations have grounded them - probably permamently.

We live in a very peculiar age. Where many of the science fiction ideas on earlier years are solid reality, but many are subject to so many stupid rules and regulations that nobody can use them.

And at the moment that seems to be very much the case with 3d printers and schools.

[JonasEichman]

Our school, unfortunately, does not have a printer. That's too bad, because it would be very useful for the children.