uCreate Supporting the Student Experience

uCreate supports a wide range of equipment and technology, from traditional hand tools to advanced equipment such as 3D scanners, VR headsets and 3D printers. Services follow a “supported self-service” format, giving students the opportunity to get hands-on with equipment safe in the knowledge that staff are on hand to provide assistance when needed. Alongside these core services, there are other opportunities the service provides. Read on to find out more.    

Supporting Student Societies 

uCreate’s Makerspace lends supports a variety of student societies with equipment, storage and meeting space for groups including the Embedded and Robotics Society, Asteria Space and Satellite, Edinburgh Rocketeers, Hyperloop and Formula Student. Below, you can find some thoughts from the founder of one of the University’s newest societies Hands-On: Yashasvi Raj   

“Hands-On was established to empower university students to actively help inspire the next generation to pursue STEM degrees…by making them more accessible and less intimidating. This society focuses on the design and facilitation of hands-on interactive activities for local schools and the distribution of student-generated activity programmes to STEM educators globally.   

While we are a new society, we have had several achievements, including being recently commissioned by STMicroelectronics, Europe's largest semiconductor manufacturer, to develop a basic electronics curriculum.   

Our weekly meetings are hosted in the uCreate Makerspace and through their generous support, we have been able to hold community engagement activities, like last semester, where we set up a bottle rocket station in the meadows and members of the community were able to construct and launch their own bottle rockets!”   

Providing Student Employment Opportunities 

uCreate is supported by student staff from across the University, each lending their unique skills to the team. We’re delighted to introduce our two newest members: Najwa and Aboodi   

“Oh hi! I am Najwa Diyana, PhD of Architecture student from the University of Edinburgh. I am currently working as Marketing Lead for uCreate and responsible for social media content and promoting all the fun workshops and events. So far, I love and enjoy every moment while working in uCreate because of the collaborative environment and helpful community. I also learned a lot about the latest technology and all the cool equipment that students can use for free. Moreover, meeting various students from different departments and hearing about their unique projects gave me a lot of motivation and inspiration for my research.”   

“Hello! My name is Aboodi Taha, uCreate Makerspace Student Technician specialising in VR (Virtual Reality) & AR (Augmented Reality). So far, I’ve been working at uCreate Makerspace for three months and my experience has been great! The team is friendly, and my managers; Mike & Anthony, are so supportive. Working in the Makerspace is exciting, there’s always something new happening, a new problem to solve, and interesting projects to support. Being a student staff is helping me build my self-confidence, as well as expand my knowledge and share my existing skills working with VR/AR technology. Overall, I’m happy at uCreate!”

uCreate will continue to support the Student Experience and as we expand we are excited to see the new staffing, skills development, society and community opportunities that will arise.