Re-making the MakerLab: A year of creative collaboration in the CECH Library
With nine locations across the uptown campus, UC Libraries serves the university’s many diverse colleges, the College of Education, Criminal Justice, Human Services (CECH) among them. Located in the Teachers-Dyer Complex, the CECH Library serves the college’s four schools – Education, Criminal Justice, Human Services and Information Technology – and is home to the only library makerspace on campus.
In a short span of 12 months, CECH Library’s MakerLab has undergone a multi-phased renewal marked by collaboration, teaching and lots of learning. “I didn’t know much about makerspaces before I started this project,” admitted education librarian Katie Foran-Mulcahy, who also serves as the CECH Library’s head. “But I do know that the renewal of library spaces, when paired with curricular need and faculty partnership, is a pretty magical combination. Looking back, we’ve achieved a lot in a year.”
Formerly known as The Production Lab, the space primarily served pre-service teachers in the School of Education. It was originally conceived as a space for creating educational materials like bulletin boards, die-cut shapes and letters and digital scans. In its prior configuration, the MakerLab served a narrow audience. While creating bulletin boards and classroom paper crafts remain crucial in many respects, K-12 curricular emphasis on making and STEM was largely unrepresented in the space.
(left) 6th-9th grade students from Breakthrough Cincinnati participate in a low-tech design challenge in the CECH Library MakerLab.
When planning the space’s revitalization, it was critical to first investigate makerspaces in the current educational environment. Foran-Mulcahy collaborated with CECH School of Education professor Sarah Schroeder to understand current needs and the kinds of makerspaces already available to local K-12 students and educators. With assistance from the Hamilton County Educational Service Center, Katie and Sarah toured spaces across the region, including Indian Hill Elementary, Harrison Junior School and St. Xavier High School.
Libraries staff also visited non-K-12 makerspaces, including Miami University, Xavier University, University of Kentucky and the Cincinnati and Hamilton County Public Library. Katie’s participation in the Makers in Education two-week intensive at the also proved essential, providing foundational knowledge and connecting UC Libraries with staff from the UC Ground Floor Makerspace at the 1819 Innovation Hub.
New acquisitions in MakerLab included a Bambu X1C 3D printer, a Roland VersaSTUDIO BN2-20A for printing/cutting stickers and graphics, and an xTool F1 Ultra for laser cutting and engraving. The reimagined MakerLab, including new equipment and furniture, became available in January as part of a spring semester pilot phase.
The Trends in Learning Technology Innovation course (IDT 4015) co-taught by Schroeder and Foran-Mulcahy played a critical role in the pilot. Students in the course created user instructional materials and provided feedback on a future model of service for the space. The importance of a space like the CECH Library MakerLab cannot be overstated. “We cannot teach teachers the way we have always taught them,” says Schroeder. “If our pre-service teachers have not had the opportunity to challenge themselves creatively, it’s going to hard for them to do that with their future students.”
Beyond the pilot, the space has gained a following both inside and outside of the College of Education, Criminal Justice, and Human Services. From custom graduation caps to Miranda Rights cards to promotional items for Short Vine, student-run literary journal, the MakerLab’s spring soft launch was busy – and creative. Summer saw more activity in the space, as it hosted the Imagination Station elective for Breakthrough Academy 6th-9th graders. The CECH Library also hosted Laila Ningtyas, a Fulbright student from Indonesia, who created software tutorials as part of her Professional Experience course in CECH’s Instructional Design master’s program.
The journey to revitalize the CECH Library played out much like John Spencer’s LAUNCH Cycle, a design thinking framework used in many K-12 classrooms. Beginning with understanding, questions, and research, creating the space itself, and then making edits based on the unforeseen, the project has been both structured and iterative in its development. “I ended up teaching the LAUNCH cycle in spring,” said Foran-Mulcahy, “only to realize that we went through our own LAUNCH cycle as we planned and developed the new space.”
As of September 2025, the space is tested, operational, and staffed by two trained MakerLab Assistants who also happen to be undergraduates in the CECH School of Education. “We need creative teachers,” said Schroeder, “now more than ever. Having a space like this gives our students the opportunity to think outside the box, going beyond their past educational experiences.” Reflecting on the CECH Library MakerLab renewal as a partnership, the project serves not only as a hub for creativity on campus, but also as a model for creative collaboration – going beyond resources and services offered in the past. “You know you’ve really struck a chord when students and faculty contact the library with questions after learning about the space through word-of-mouth,” said Foran-Mulcahy. “The pilot did what it was supposed to do, and now the college and the library have space we can all be proud of.”
