MIAD’s Innovation Center taking a new approach on learning and technology

College students are taught to memorize information so they can get As on exams. But some in education worry this sort approach hinders a student’s creativity, and one local institution wants to prove creativity and good grades can go together.

Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design (MIAD) hopes it has created that space. The MIAD Innovation Center is a new program and maker space on campus that focuses on community engagement, new technology and a student’s ability to have full creative freedom.

When the program started at the beginning of 2018, Drew Maxwell became a candidate for the executive director, based on his impact on campus and his professional business background.

“What I love about this program is that it’s outside of grades,” Maxwell
said. “I’m all about real growth and innovation, which comes out of vulnerability. You have to get lost in the woods and not know what you’re doing to find something of great value, and you’re going to fail a lot.”

Instead of focusing on the grades and coursework, the program focuses on what the student desires. Maxwell and his colleagues hope to facilitate a space where failure is welcome. A student can take that knowledge, understand why they failed, and work to make a better solution the next time.

“Failure is a part of every success that has ever happened,” said Maxwell. “A lot of innovation comes out of mistakes. Innovation should surprise you.”

The Innovation Center is housed next to two other creative facilities: the prototyping lab, which includes industrial laser and vinyl cutters and 3D printers, and the textiles lab, with a loom and sewing machines. Their main space is a conference room, with room to collaborate and an area set up with virtual reality headsets and programs.

“We have a lot of students that engage in all three of these spaces and kind of rotate through them,” said Maxwell. “We’re like three ships in a fleet.”

The program offers many resources to students. It’s an open space, where students can roam in and out to use equipment, ask questions or ask for feedback, or just hang out. The program hosts weekly creative events, including talks and presentations from alumni or community entrepreneurs and artists. It also hosts creative challenges where students compete to create the best design or product, sometimes for a cash prize. Some previous challenges included creating a comic book page in a virtual reality space and developing a campus-wide emergency communication app.

The program also collaborates with local businesses to get students jobs doing art and design work. Students in the center work closely with local clients to create a new and exciting way to tell the client’s story. In the past, students have designed bottle labels for an up and coming printing business, and they’ve created augmented reality posters for local events. One student has designed a set of children’s toys in the center that he hopes to sell to a company.

“The students have had multiple years training for this, and now they get to apply it,” said Drew. “They can graduate with a list of clients that they already had worked with, they’re already professionals.” 

MIAD Alumni Hannah Hallman is impressed with the diversity the lab has accomplished.

“They have everything from VR to 3D printing to the sewing lab one room over,” said Hallman. “Everyone, illustrators, industrial designers and fine artists, can utilize the space.”

This is only the beginning for the Innovation Lab. They hit the ground running and they do not have any plans to stop. 

“Right now it’s kind of Level 1, this is Phase 1,” said Drew. “We are going to build the plane as we fly it. If we try to predetermine exactly what it will be, it won’t be innovative.”