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John Westrum is the Vice President of Operations at Afinia, a division of Microboards Technology, LLC.  John has been instrumental in introducing the Afinia 3D printer into the US market, and has a long-term view on products and sales with his 20+ year tenure as a VP at Microboards.  John knows his business inside and out including the marketing and sales, the support and engineering, as well as the purchasing side.  We approached John because we were interested in his views both of Maker Education as well as his perspective on our core question, "What is the purpose of an education?".

Category: Business Professionals
Original Release Date: 10/30/14

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Dan Miller, President of 48 Days LLC, is our guest this week on the TTI Podcast. Dan specializes in creative thinking for increased personal and business success. He believes meaningful work blends our natural skills and abilities, our unique personality traits and our dreams and passions. He is active in helping individuals redirect careers, evaluate new income sources, and achieve balanced living. Dan is the author of the New York Times best-selling 48 Days To The Work You Love, No More Dreaded Mondays and Wisdom Meets Passion.

If you’ve ever buried your dreams in an attempt to be “practical” or “realistic,” Dan believes embracing those very dreams is the most practical way to enjoy life and achieve success. In his mind, a clear sense of direction can help us become all we were meant to be.

Category: Business Professionals

Original Release Date: 10/23/14

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Meg earned her Masters of Library Science from and has taught in Syracuse University’s School of Information. For the past two years she has worked as the Systems Administrator and Chief Maker at the Chattanooga Public Library where she lead the The 4th Floor project, a public laboratory and educational facility with a focus on information, design, technology, and the applied arts. She has 5 years of library experience, having developed innovative, civic-minded library projects featured in Wired, on NPR, and in the Whitney Biennial. Meg explores and tests various service models for creative, open-ended public spaces--models which leverage community expertise, allow for growth and flexibility, and evolve according to local needs in ways that align with fundamental library values like inclusiveness, access, and cooperation. She thinks of libraries as active testing grounds for building the society that should exist.

Meg loves to read and perhaps above all else is committed to remaining open to new experiences. She is just as interested in promoting opportunities to learn traditional crafts like weaving as she is in facilitating classes using Arduino and 3D printers.

Geoff Millener was born in New Zealand, raised in Tennessee and educated in Massachusetts. He attended Amherst College, where he spent a great deal of time reading, writing and being cold; he has since returned to Chattanooga, where he’s employed by the Mozilla Foundation working to bridge the digital divide through coordinating the Gigabit Community Fund projects and building a Hive Learning Community. He also teaches an introductory class on 3-D printing for the Chattanooga Public Library’s 4th Floor.

Category: Makers & Innovators / Innovative Educators

Original Release Date: 10/16/14

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Gary Stager is one of the world’s leading experts and advocates for computer programming, robotics and learning-by-doing in classrooms. In 1990, Dr. Stager led professional development in the world’s first laptop schools and played a major role in the early days of online education. In addition to being a popular keynote speaker at some of the world’s most prestigious education conferences, Gary is a journalist, educator, consultant, professor, and software developer.

Sylvia Martinez works in schools around the world to bring the power of authentic learning into classrooms, particularly in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math subjects. Sylvia speaks, writes, and advocates for student-centered, project-based learning, gender equity in technology, computer programming, and life-long learning.  For the past ten years, Sylvia was President of Generation YES, a non-profit working to empower young people to improve their schools and communities with modern technology.

Together this dynamic duo has written a great new book titled, "Invent to Learn".

Category: Innovative Educators

Original Release Date: 10/9/14

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Today on our podcast we will be talking with Alex Huthmacher.  Alex is the Manager of Network Infrastructure at 21st Century Fox where he Manages projects, configures network devices, firewalls, switches, load balancers, ect.  Before working at FOX Alex was network engineer at Sandia National Laboratories where he focused on security in network integration.  Alex has also worked at the Xerox data center in San Diego where he helped them migrate the infrastructure to Texas.  With all this experience you might expect a much older man, but Alex's determination, hands-on experience, and insatiable curiosity have served him well at his young age.

Category: Business Professionals

Original Release Date: 10/2/14