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Increase Shop Stewardship
One of the areas that is most conspicuously in need of better stewardship is the machine shop. No students set out to purposely harm equipment or make work-spaces a mess, but it still happens due to a lack of communication and knowledge. With the help of the shop staff, we planned to address this communication gap to increase the level of stewardship by informing students of their responsibilities.
Cleaning Up the Mini Wood Shop
There's a big problem with cleanliness in the mini wood shop. We have a dust collector, but it cannot achieve perfect results and students don't always clean up after themselves. Thus, sawdust is usually all over the floor, in the air, and stuck to walls (which is a big fire hazard). We're addressing these issues several ways.
First, we recommended the JDS Air-Tech HP air filter unit to Andy DeMelia, who has seen that it is installed. This filter hangs from the ceiling and cycles through all air in the room, catching the ambient sawdust. The filter turns on with the lights and continues filtering for an hour or two after they are turned off.
A huge contributor to the dust is the panel saw. We asked the students in charge of panel saw training to emphasize clean-up during training. The dust surrounding the saw should be smaller.
A final idea related to wood shop stewardship was requesting that Design Nature professors put more emphasis on proper use of machines during the stressful projects. We hope to see organized clean-ups, reminders of shop etiquette, and training review. Hopefully that will allow us to avoid things like this:
First, we recommended the JDS Air-Tech HP air filter unit to Andy DeMelia, who has seen that it is installed. This filter hangs from the ceiling and cycles through all air in the room, catching the ambient sawdust. The filter turns on with the lights and continues filtering for an hour or two after they are turned off.
A huge contributor to the dust is the panel saw. We asked the students in charge of panel saw training to emphasize clean-up during training. The dust surrounding the saw should be smaller.
A final idea related to wood shop stewardship was requesting that Design Nature professors put more emphasis on proper use of machines during the stressful projects. We hope to see organized clean-ups, reminders of shop etiquette, and training review. Hopefully that will allow us to avoid things like this:
Posting Laminated Instruction Cards
The biggest issue in the machine shops is lack of communication and knowledge. Students often go months or years between using machines, but as long as they have been formally trained at some point, they are not required to undergo training again. Unfortunately, students often do not remember exactly how to use a machine. People forget small steps, such as cleaning off machines and returning drill bits. Thus, by recommendation of the Academic Facilities Committee, we created instruction cards, which we placed beside each machine. Students still need training, but the cards should remind them of steps they might have forgotten. The cards are also a reminder to clean up and organize tools after use.