Exploring meaning-making and innovation in makerspaces: An ethnographic study of student and faculty perspectives

In academic makerspaces, students explore innovative practices. Whether they see these spaces as a means to pursue innovation, however, remains to be understood. This paper examines how makerspaces and innovation are connected by the meanings that students and faculty attribute to makerspaces. Ethnographic techniques were used as the methodology to uncover these meanings. The findings presented in this paper are from the Fall 2016 semester where one graduate researcher explored and observed the engineering makerspaces, an elite student group, and an interdisciplinary collaborative research team. Through the field notes, meanings of interaction, functionality, environment, and innovation provide insight into how students and faculty perceive the value and impact of engineering makerspaces.