Making Makers: Inventionland Education’s Formula for Future Creators

In that field and when I was a young person , I really enjoyed the science fairs and I know that most of the kids in my neighborhood really they enjoyed it as well , and it really pushed me over time into the field of science because I like the idea of wondering how things come to be .

And so that probably tied back to a point in my life that I saw starting to disappear .

And then , in addition to that , all the work that we were doing in building and making products a lot of that work and factory work was being outsourced to places overseas , and when I saw that start to happen , I immediately concluded that , hey , that's a serious problem for the field of invention , because we invent a lot of things in systems inside factories that

make things . So if all the manufacturing is going to go somewhere else , the pace of innovation is going to slow down , which in turn leads to less opportunity for our next wave of youth coming up in America . So I said , no , we're going to do something about that .

We then went about thinking about well , how could we make an impact to inspire our youth so we can maintain a dominant position in the field of innovation and invention , like we have for the last hundred years ? And so we developed a courseware system that goes into the public schools K through 12 .

And we have specific breakdowns elementary , middle school and high school and at the very end they have an invention contest that they put on in their school . So not only do we take the kids through the principles of how to get there , and we teach them how to develop ideas and how to do good in the world , and that's where you find opportunity .

We then realized , well , we have to teach the teachers how to do this , and so we started doing that .

And then at the end of the course there's this contest , and then the judges get through a little training system so they understand how to judge , and so you can actually build a methodology of getting through all the kids with their inventions within a reasonable amount of time . So that's basically how it all got started .

My role is basically creating and leading this initiative to try and get it to not only be in a regional space around our area , which is where it was first prototyped , here in Pittsburgh and then perfected over 10 years . But now to take it on a national level and eventually we'll see it might go global , because we have some kids overseas now doing it too .

And if somebody else could build this , I could build it too . So life around him was always interesting because he was curious , which then was put into all the kids in our Cub Scouts and then up through the ages . But you know other things , other mentors came into play . You know that started to push me into the science field .

But when I was in chemistry class I really excelled in that area and I really enjoyed the experiments and doing all the lab work . And I went to college going in pre-med .

So I had a very heavy science influence in my earlier days in college and then , with a lot more thought around that , I realized you know , I'm not so sure I want to spend all my time in a hospital . So I started to wonder is this really right for me ? Because I was just inside these white starch labs night and day .

And so some other thoughts came in I said you know what ? We have a long history of business in our family , so over time we just basically combined science

and business into you know now what we do today .

So you'll notice , if you go back through time and you look at inventors that are , you know , the Louis Pasteur , the Edisons , anybody and everybody that you might think of as an inventor they tend to put themselves second and they're looking out at how can we help other people , not deal with this problem .

And if we could make that problem go away or make it so it's not such a big problem , that would free people up to be able to go do better things in their lives . You know , maybe even in the health field , you know , if you can solve medical challenges right , so it's really I'd say it's a very good life .

You're chasing noble causes that are there to help others . Some noble causes are smaller right , like if you're just fixing something that maybe you know , maybe it's easier to take out the garbage versus you're solving a huge health issue for a lot of people in the world .

But regardless , the mindset is , you know , applicable toward corporate America and you know , they're always trying to make better products because they're competing on that front . And then you've got government , right . You've got all these government labs that are out there .

They employ many , many thousands of research and development people and they're trying to also create new things like new forms of energy , new pretty much everything . And so to me , that field , the field of R&D and invention , is exciting , and chasing the unknown has always been attractive to me .

And then Henry Ford , when he started to invent a new frame for his car that was much easier to manufacture and that you could assemble a car much more quickly . So that's manufacturing and there's all sorts of patents around that . And then , in the realm of storytelling , walt Disney and Walt was an inventor too .

Most people don't know that he was not only a great storyteller , but there are inventions related to Walt as well . So it's inventing , making and storytelling . Those are the three mentors for me anyway Edison , ford and Disney .

Today , I get to be in spaces with presidents and CEOs of some of the largest corporations in the world and I kept hearing the same thing over and over and I finally said I'm going to do something about it . But one person in particular , denise .

She's one of the divisional presidents at Caterpillar Corporation and she said to me we can't find enough STEM science , technology , engineering , math or STEAM science , technology , engineering , art and math people to hire , so they're having a hiring crisis . And I found that to be , you know , like , okay , I'm paying attention , right , I'm listening .

And then I heard it again and again and again and then I realized , well , we actually have a real big problem if the HR departments of all these major corporations don't have people to hire . So that , lets us look at that and say , all right , that's a serious problem . Now , can we chase a noble cause ? Where's the noble cause here ?

We chase a noble cause . Where's the noble cause here . Well , young people are . You know , how can we have really interesting lives for them to live and make a good livelihood for themselves ? Well , when corporations are hiring in these departments , they're in demand . These are high-paying jobs , and so that's a good thing .

Even on our show too , we've had the nuclear labs , the government nuclear lab people , and you know those are very high paying jobs

too in the field of science and invention . So you know , I think overall the recognizing , being able to be in the right position at the right time and recognizing the need for more people in this area was a big thing for us and so our role .

I look at it as how can we not only maintain the pace of innovation in this country , but how can we accelerate that pace and stay way ahead of the rest of the world ?

Well , yes , there is curriculum in the teacher colleges to teach math in all sorts of levels and in English , et cetera , et cetera , sorts of levels and English , et cetera , et cetera . But the art of invention is not taught .

So you do have a challenge in identifying who can teach this type of technology and you need to be ready to release the reins , because they have to be skilled in several areas .

And then you basically release the reins on the learners Because they're chasing their own ideas in this course , and what happens is you get a shift , and it's a major shift , so that , yes , they're learning math , they're learning science , they're learning English .

Well , english isn't storytelling , english is writing , which you need in this course You're going to make in the manufacturing and making of your prototypes . You're going to have to do some . You're going to have to use a 3D printer , maybe , or a laser cutter , you're going to have to cut a piece of wood at a certain angle .

You're going to do a math , you're going to have to figure out the math right , and then , in the earlier stage of inventing , you're using your observational skills and your thinking skills to try and figure out problems .

So the challenge , though , is having really good teachers who can let , go and let , and they're basically a support system to the students , and then they elicit help from other teachers in the school . So it's hey , you know , we're going to have the math teacher to help come in and figure out , maybe some of the angles on cuts we need to make .

What's the formula , the mathematical formula to do this , so that Sally or Joe can actually make that prototype or model that they're trying to build . And so , and because it's the kids' thoughts and ideas and they're applying themselves , you don't .

And because it's the kids' thoughts and ideas and they're applying themselves , you don't have to tell them to do their homework . They do this work , and actually , there's a new problem , and the new problem is you can't get them to stop , because they're working on their idea and they start to see it come to life .

So , before you know it , the school bell is ringing and they don't want to go . So then they show up after class or after school and the parents ?

Some of the comments we hear back from them are you know , I love what my kid's doing and they're like working on this stuff over the weekends where you know before they were just sitting down behind a screen playing video games .

So I took , I took a lot of the more successful products and I reverse engineered them and I said , okay , what are the repeatable things that we're doing again and again and again and again to get to this outcome ? And we took those and we compressed them into these nine basic steps .

Of course , there's more than nine steps , but in order to make it comprehensible , we had to put it into that format . But also , you know , I'm not a curriculum writer .

So we ended up hiring very talented curriculum writers who came in and then they took all of our work and then they reworked it into pass , all the different state requirements and that type of thing , which was amazing to watch as well .

There's a real effort that you could see over time from our let's call them the school leadership people in this country to try and you know make education work , and right now it's working and it's just getting innovated now .

So before we were more of a like , you used to see all the classrooms and it was all the tables , all the chairs were lined up like this and there was a teacher's chair here in our innovation labs . You know that's shifting now and it's the teacher roams the kids are in . They're at desks that have wheels because they're doing inventing .

Sometimes , then they're doing making and then other times they're getting ready to do all their storytelling as they approach their invention contest . So these labs have to be manageable and moved around accordingly , because sometimes the projects have to go on the floor .

They move around , there's all sorts of stuff going on , and so a mobile room that is designed to inspire them and support them in their initiatives is another advancement that we've worked on .

But when they go and they release the idea out to their class and then they release it

as they do here on the show , it's gone public at that point . But they've learned the principles of going through the process like it is inside a private institution In our course , where they're taught that .

But they're learning and so our hope is that they're learning and disclosing which is fine for now , learning and disclosing which is fine for now , but in time , as a lot of our youth are moved up into the corporate world and the government world , they've learned the principles of inventing .

Because what I've seen over time , you can create the greatest invention in the world , but if you can't figure out a way to get it into manufacturing , that's a serious problem . That idea or that invention is going to stay in the inventing stage forever until you figure out a way to get it manufactured so it can scale .

And then , if you can figure that out and then you can tell a story , or if you can't tell a story In other words , if you can't tell a story more than likely you're not going to get the funding you need to launch a company or to push that up into the world to get it out to everybody to benefit them .

So I , over time , have seen too many inventions get stuck here and so we learned over 36 years . I've been working at this for 36 years . So what I saw was too many things stalled here because they couldn't get through the manufacturing process properly , and so we would go back into the inventing phase with me .

So when I'm doing my inventing , I'm immediately looking at well , let me think about that . If I do it this certain way , I'm going to need tooling . And then I'm going to need to , let's say , do injection , blow molding as an example , like a water bottle or something , or something .

Well , that's expensive , whereas if I go this direction , I might not need tooling . And so that's part of the conversation going on in the mind as you select a direction on your invention . But ultimately , once you get through those two , you have to tell the story , to raise money or to manage the project into a business , et cetera , et cetera .

You're going to talk to people about it . So these three things work in concert in order to get the idea either to a board of directors to approve it or to start a company . So you're talking to an investor . So you're going to make public disclosures .

What we're hoping is that our youth , when they're in K through 12 , they're going to learn this system , and that is more important at that stage , even though we've seen over the last two years in our last couple invention contests , four teams have had their inventions licensed and two of them have now been in the market and selling and those kids are making

royalties today .

And if you do a lot of inventing over time and you're a creative person , you will notice that you will withdraw from the creative energy that you have if you don't get outside into the natural world .

So we talk about how to manage yourself as a human being , and we've studied this over time here at Inventionland , where we've watched fabulous inventors , very creative guys and gals who are working nonstop on solving problems and inventing solutions , and we represent that with the open hand . In other words , they're in sync .

Their mind is free and it's coming up with solutions and it's just really working really well . And at times , though , they run into problems , and then that mind's not so free anymore and it's just really working really well . And at times , though , they run into problems , and then the mind's not so free anymore and it's getting locked up .

Eventually , it gets to the point where you know you've got like the white on your knuckles and you're not getting any more ideas out of that locked-up brain .

And so what we do is we train people on when to recognize that you're like that , and our managers recognize when people are like that and they'll say , hey , you need to go out , go somewhere , go outside , get out in nature , go down by the water and the river , whatever , go , unlock yourself .

And so we use nature as an unlocker and we you'll see that , like in tomorrow's world . Today , when they post , they're posting about everything from what's going on in the natural world to how to kick your shoes off and get in the grass , look at the clouds . You will unlock very quickly . And so that is the world of inspiration . You need that in your life .

From there you can go to the world of creation . The world of creation is all about traditional arts , right ? So traditional arts exist in schools , in many of the schools today . Right , that's painting , doing pottery , maybe doing some stained glass clubs and things of that nature . Baking is in there , cooking , gardening , those kinds of traditional arts , right ?

Traditional arts are very , very important for the creative human being . It's also an unlocker , so that if you're deep down the rabbit hole in working in technology and you want to release yourself , if you haven't noticed , well , it's interesting that I get unlocked when I'm over here and I'm creating a recipe for some kind of new thing that I'm cooking .

Well , that's actually not unusual . You're doing a creative art and so it's pulling you out and so , knowing again , it's pulling you back to free yourself , right ? So when you're doing traditional arts , it's a creative expression that is wonderful .

In what you can create , I like well , I used to take blacksmithing classes and lots of other types of art that I enjoy and it brings happiness to me . And then when I decide to go and immerse myself into the innovation arts again , I'm ready . So let's talk about that . That's the world of innovation , and innovation arts can be highly complex .

Just , traditional arts can be very complex to master , right ? You don't see many Michelangelos out there , but you can enjoy yourself there and give yourself that wonderful feeling which gives you health . Over here . You're in this unknown world a lot , you're going to fail a lot and you have to learn . How do I get back up ?

I just tried this , like this courseware . It was 10 years of incremental modifications to get it perfected to the point where it could work seamlessly for a school out in Kansas as well as out in New York City , right . So you know it took a lot of failure . Get back up , listen to your audience . What are they telling you ? Where is it working ?

Where is it not working ? And that'll wear you down over time , because we all like to think what we create is just so wonderful , but it's only wonderful when others use it , and it doesn't require a lot of work on their part to use your service or your product .

And so , making it simple to teach the art of invention and innovation , making it simple to do this in these nine steps , it's all part of that world of innovation that we were talking about , right ? And so the last world , which is the world of production .

So that is where you convert your innovation into something that can be then scaled and given to the public at a price that they can afford . Ok , so , and also , production , is it's repeatable and sustainable , right ?

So I might only have a prototype in the world of innovation , and then again , I have to figure it out , get it scaled and then I have to get it funded . So , over here in the world of production you're talking about , have you ever gone on a factory tour ?

Yep , so if you can imagine factory tours in between the world of innovation , where they came up with whatever it was that they created as their product , and then going and building a 200,000 square foot factory . Well , I guarantee you there's probably another 50 inventions inside that building that make this process come together .

So you get this thing out here at the end , and along with that , there's another process , and that's the financial engineering of production , right ? So you have to become business literate , so to speak . And so that is our four worlds inspiration , creation , innovation and production .

And they work as an ecosystem and you manage yourself and your organization accordingly , and if you do that , you'll stay healthy , you'll be happy with your work for forever . You just have to stay inside that realm , right , and because it can get very complex .

classroom now .

But sitting in the classroom and having it pushed at you versus you applying that , it's a totally different learning experience . One is engaging , the other is basically not . Certain students can excel at you know , book smart , stem and STEAM . What I find interesting is A lot of the students who they say are you know , they're not the best learners out there .

That's not true . What's true is is they learn differently and they learn . My observation and I will prove this out over time my observation is that STEM and STEAM students are nonstoppable when you get them into applied STEM and STEAM curriculums . But they're not going to sit .

They're not going to sit all day long and read and make note cards and read and make note cards . No , they have too much energy . They've got to get up and move around . But whenever you start getting into a maker , the making and that interesting area for them , they thrive in that environment . You can't stop them .

So it's interesting to watch because our kids they tend to learn on a three-person team and it's usually broken into that three pieces inventing , making . So one's more inventing , another one's more making and the other one's more storytelling .

So if you think about it , storytelling is marketing , right , you know , the making side is more of you know in a factory they like to get their hands dirty and whatnot and the inventing side is more of somebody who wonders about how things work in the world .

But when you take those three type of our youthful people and you get them to start working together and brainstorming together and then make a team exercise , come together , what we hear is that a lot of the kids who are your C students are getting the A's in that class and a lot of the kids who get A's in all the other classes , like just the pure math

class they're getting the C's in this class . So we're seeing a very unique balance and that's doing something else that nobody expected , and that is we're seeing a more collaborative , friendly environment in those schools , because those kids don't usually connect and now in this course they connect and so then they see each other in the hall and they're communicating .

It's just a wonderful like another ecosystem that's been formed that nobody saw coming .

There will be no lack of innovators at that time .

So , like we use a lot of AI right now right , and we weren't using any AI a couple of years ago but it makes suggestions and it tells you about research that used to take us I mean , it could take three months to gather all the research that we would want to gather on a project .

I can get that in 30 minutes now , and the sources that it's drawing from are so good .

There's a lot of work involved with getting through it and then you have to refine it , but the other thing that we found there is that it also helps us to come up with more ideas , which we really like , and we also do a lot of patent searches , because the patent searches reveal what other inventors have done in the past , and it's not like you want to do

what they're doing , but you could see how they solve . They were thinking of solving a certain problem . It might even be a totally different industry . So maybe something that they were working on in the medical field is now applicable toward some kind of a mechanism that holds something during surgery .

Maybe that same kind of mechanism might be needed when you're working on a car , and in the automotive aftermarket we could devise a tool . It's totally different , but one's holding something and this is also holding something . But you know , that's interesting , right . And then we would also study nature . How does nature hold something , right ?

So you would study the hand and you would study animals , seeing how it does things and taking a look at what we refer to as crossovers , things from other industries that might be , let's say , holding something . And you take those , we take those three , we kind of jam them up into the same space and see what we get with it .

That's not how we would do things . Maybe in the future , if AI and CAD work a little closer together , we'll see that . But we want to work with AI to generate the ideas . Then our human minds the engineering side of our minds we'll take a look at how we want to design that and we'll work with CAD , computer-aided design to make that .

Now we can look at that and we can see the paths of how the 3D printer will make it before it goes . What it doesn't do , which is very dangerous , is that you can make things in the 3d printer right that you can't make in mass production right that's a serious problem . a lot of people think that because I made it in 3d printing , I can make it in .

You know , I can stamp for million of these things . And that's not the case . And we , we knew that 20 years ago . Our first 3D printers were huge , like you know . You and I could stand inside them . Actually , 20 of us could stand inside them . That's how big they were and they made these little tiny parts Heck .

Now they're this big and you can get really decent parts and they're actually strong . In the

early days it wasn't like that . But that transition early on we said this is the most dangerous thing ever . We used to have to figure out all that engineering and then go look at how it's going to be manufactured .

Well , we noticed that some people in our office started actually using the 3D printer to make components that couldn't be made other than inside that machine and we said , oh my gosh , how many other people are going to struggle with this ?

And so today , you know what I prefer is I prefer to look at telling them hey , if you're going to put something into that 3D printer , you better make darn sure it's going to be stampable or injection moldable or that it matches up with these processes .

Otherwise , yeah , you can make a model as a demonstration , but don't make the claim that that will translate to something that's affordable to make . Right , Right . So , it's very we have to be very careful with that , so that AI to 3D printing is sketchy , right .

That has another level of sketchiness to all this , actually , until , and this does exist today , so things are changing , but you can mass produce 3D printing . Okay , it's a little more expensive , right , but over time you'll probably see that .

So the inventing process is where I'd say our most important work has been , and then the conversion of that to courseware and then to create a system that is teachable , teacher , trainable , judge , monitored and reward systems .

At the end , unbeatable system , will lead to what we know , we created here , be adoptable to our youth , which will , in turn , be embraced by industry because they'll be hiring these people who understand how to think better , how to work with their hands naturally and know how to speak to others about it naturally .

So you'll see more innovation get accepted and funded because they will understand the value of inventing , making and storytelling when they go forth to bring it into the world .

If you want to push the sustainability , environmental side of things , you know we can push that really hard , and the more you push that , that's an exciting field because there's a lot of innovation , because you could literally look at every single system that exists in the world today and say how can I make that thing , that pump , use less energy ?

You could chase that quest for 10 years and maybe invent a new kind of motor that will let you do that or some way to create a vacuum in a better way that consumes less energy , and that's noble work . So we're consuming less natural resources along the way . So , yeah , I mean the field of sustainability is just full of opportunity for innovation work .

one big question for you . Okay , what do you think is going to be the next big innovation in your industry ? Don't give away any trade secrets .

We believe we have found certain routes to make that happen , because it's a slow process . To get schools to adopt this process , right , there's a lot of work . You have to teach the teachers , you have to have an innovation lab installed in your school , you have to have equipment .

I mean , if you can imagine back in the day , look your question , I'm going to walk you back for a minute . Over 100 years ago , and everybody knows what science is today , right , but at one time there was no chemistry class , right . There were these people over there in Europe , let's say . They looked like wizards and you don't even have pictures of them .

We have these old oil paintings of these masters who were messing around with black powder and they were just experimenting , right .

Until here in Pittsburgh , actually , this gentleman his last name is Fisher he decided he was going to take the art of what used to be called alchemy , and he was going to turn that into a system where you could do science , experimentation and we're going to systemize this right .

So he created the world's first science lab and brought about tools like a beaker from Germany , a Bunsen burner , like all the common instruments that you see in a chemistry lab today . Well , 120 years ago that wasn't around . So if you said to him , what do you think the future holds In tomorrow's world ? What are we going to see , mr Fisher ?

He'd probably think , oh , I'm not really quite sure , but in reality his work is responsible for generating tens of millions of jobs . If you think about it , there are entire industries that revolve around the field of science , and Fisher Scientific was the most basic building block of it all .

So they had to teach teachers how to teach chemistry and science , and the corporations needed them because they needed to do quality control right . So something comes out of a factory . You got to check it . You got to put it into the lab , make sure it's doing what it's supposed to be doing . That's part of it .

Then you have pure R&D , because you want to invent a new product in the lab , right , and so he basically built this infrastructure , which then led others to say , well , we got what . We have a pharmaceutical industry , we have a biotech industry . I mean , I could go on and on about how many industries blossomed out of that .

I wish I could tell you what our students of the future , what industries they're going to invent . But with this kind of mindset of you can invent anything . You can make anything better if you're willing to think that way and work hard toward that objective .

I wish I could tell you what all those kids who are going to turn into adults are going to invent , what industries they're going to create , how many new jobs are going to come about in 100 years ? My only hope is that if it can be as promising as what the fishers did back then ,

we've done our job .