Hello.
My name is Jacob Logas, and today I'll
be talking with you about tensions between access
and control in makerspaces.
The maker movement seeks to increase inclusion, equity,
and access in steam.
Makerspaces were built to accomplish
this, democratizing expensive tools and software
such as wood shops, 3D printers, musical instruments,
and professional modeling software
while providing mentors to aid and learning them.
However, we hypothesized the makerspaces mission
as complicated by access control.
To test our hypothesis, we performed
semi-structured interviews with 16 makerspace administrators,
and surveyed 48 makerspace users between March and May of 2020,
about policy and access control.
Most of the administrators we spoke
with identified as makers, and agreed with tenets
of the maker movement.
Particularly, they identified with the idea
that 'makers' tools and education
are to be democratized for greater public access.
Administrators generally voiced a desire
for their makerspace to be even more open and accessible.
Though of the 16 interviewees we spoke with,
only one was willing to give unlimited access
to their users, a small for-profit enterprise.
Why is this?
If the goal of makerspace is to have the greatest
amount of access, shouldn't more be willing to be open 24/7?
Why enforce control if access is of the utmost importance?
Control is necessary because makerspaces
contain expensive machinery that is dangerous or easily broken
if mishandled.
Thus, controlled access to the tools
is necessary to maintain a viable makerspace.
Access to the equipment often requires
an orientation or strict adherence to safety procedures.
These are enforced by the administrator and staff
personally.
Though, makerspaces are generally
underfunded and understaffed.
As administrators rely on the staff to maintain control,
makerspaces are closed when none are available.
Makerspaces we interviewed cannot, for example,
afford to have staff present after 5 or 6 PM.
Some even has issues staffing throughout the day
because their staff works on a volunteer basis
and have other responsibilities.
When staff are in the makerspace,
they are stretched then with administrative and custodial
tasks, leaving little time for mentorship.
The aforementioned factors of control
illustrated a trend in policies.
Many makerspace policies exist solely for safety reasons.
From this we line control with the desired safety
of the makerspace.
Safety is an admirable goal and one that administrators rarely
wish to dismiss outright.
Though, in our interviews, we discovered
most policies are flexible, with exceptions
being made regularly.
Exceptions are situational and vary from administrator
to administrator, but three reasons
were consistently mentioned.
First, exceptions are made to keep up with demand,
with staffing shortages administrators must
make concessions to keep up.
These exceptions though are only allowed
if it can be done safely or if the administrator trusts
the requester.
Second, exceptions can improve the working relationship
with staff.
Administrators we interviewed gave makerspace staff
extensive leeway, at times even extending it
to friends of staff.
This works both to build competency among staff
and to entice users to become staff themselves.
Third, exceptions are given to users
with whom the administrator has built a level of trust.
This can include interpersonal trust,
trust in their abilities, or trust in their motives.
Though as mentioned before, makerspaces are understaffed,
and administrators do not have the capacity
to personally approve or deny every request,
or even to prevent unapproved access.
So makerspaces use digital access control systems.
These are meant to alleviate some staff responsibilities,
but instead complicates their duties,
requiring them to compensate for the system's failings.
This is a result of existing systems
not mapping to the makerspace model of access,
leaving gaps for staff to fill.
Though this creates a problem for more than just
the administrators, users reported feeling unduly impeded
by the current state of access control.
No amount of familiarity, demonstrated competency,
or negotiation with existing systems will grant access.
Instead, users must either find staff
who have the authority and time to overwrite it, or be locked
out of the resource entirely.
So the question becomes, how can access control
be custom-tailored for makerspaces?
To us, the answer is clear.
Context.
Every exception administrators told us
about where the result of contextual reasoning, access
decisions were based on whether the user was
trustworthy, competent staff, or even
had a convincing reason why they needed access.
We can foresee future work that uses our findings here
to develop a new class of access control.
One that integrates maker space usage metrics with a learning
agent to integrate context and automated access decisions.
Through advances and conversational agents,
a user might even be able to negotiate for access
as they would with administrators.
Overall, integrating our findings
into the design of makerspace-centric access
control will help makerspaces fulfill their mission.