Marc Antonucci, 16, operated a robot on wheels about the size of a poodle designed by himself and other student in the new Makerspace area at Lake Forest High School.
“The problem for this year is how to get it up the ramp,” Antonucci said as he fiddled with a remote control.
The Lake Forest High School Makerspace, which officially opened in late January, is literally a place to make things, usually those connected with science, technology, engineering, art design and math.
Makerspaces partially evolved from digital fabrication labs or “fab labs” at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said Kemi Jona, who works at the office of STEM Education Partnerships at Northwestern University. Such equipment first appealed to adult hobbyists and have also been pushed at the federal level – mostly under the Obama administration – as a way to revive American advanced manufacturing, Jona said.
