Education is a vaccine against poverty and builds resilience. The cost of educational materials is often a barrier to (i) accessing a quality education and (ii) providing an adaptive teaching program to meet the special needs of learners.
Having a 3D printer is like having a 3D photocopier in your classroom. The benefits of 3D printing educational supplies on-site is the ability to provide affordable, customized, and creative learning experiences for diverse learners and to foster innovation, creativity, critical thinking, empathy, and skills-building for 21st century job opportunities.
Our digital library contains a range of 3D printable solutions of educational supplies for vulnerable, hard to reach populations. We strive to design our 3D printable files to require no post-processing, be high-quality, safe, user-friendly, low cost, and sustainable for low-resource settings.
We have been crowdsourcing a digital catalog of low-cost 3D printable puzzles, games and toys for children caught in conflict zones or emergencies. These items are inspired by the UNICEF Early Childhood Development Kit which contains materials to help educators provide a healthy learning environment for young children.
Our catalog is designed to be printed on a portable, user-friendly 3D printing system that can be operated off-grid and offline by non-experts. This open-filament printing system uses open-source printing software and can print a range of rigid and flexible materials, including biodegradable and recycled plastic.
With 3D printing, anybody can be an innovator. Today’s it’s possible to take an idea, draw it digitally using free software, and make it physically real by clicking “print.” We are working in partnership with Medical Makers -- a global community of 200+ innovators in over 10 countries -- to crowdsource low-cost, 3D printable and even customized educational supplies for individuals and communities in need. These design challenges are unique learning experiences that promote creativity, teamwork, problem-solving, and critical thinking in educators and students.
This program aims to transform education for the:
- Over 90% of the world’s population who do not hold college degrees
- 150 million kids with a disability or difference
- 142 million teenagers who are not enrolled in secondary school
- 61 million children who do not have access to primary education
With 3D printing, physical objects can be stored as digital files. We are building a digital archive to benefit humanity. Our 3D printing learning solutions will not only help people we know, they will help people we will never meet and will continue to help people after we’re gone.
