By SHANNON O. WELLS
To one school of thought, the digital revolution and easy internet access would inevitably render public and campus libraries obsolete, or at least far less crucial to society and university life than they were historically.
Pitt’s tech innovation-driven Open Lab, which was greatly expanded as part of the Hillman Library’s initial renovations in 2023, however, suggests the opposite is true.
In fact, emerging and evolving technologies — virtual and augmented reality and 3-D printing among them — provide an entire new realm of centrally located materials that significantly augment the library’s traditional arsenal of books and other print-based learning materials.
In a Nov. 15 presentation to the Senate Library committee, Aaron Brenner, associate University librarian for technology, digital scholarship and creation, emphasized the Open Lab’s versatile role in the library’s ever-evolving mission.
“At a very general level, when we think about the library's goals and aspirations there to support teaching, research and learning at the University, that is irrespective of what form that takes,” he said. “Traditionally, that has been very focused on the written word and in print materials.
“But as time passes and the diversity of forms of academic production and scholarship change,” he added, “we should be changing with it.”
Calling the Open Lab a “concrete example of a broader mission shift,” Brenner said such innovations demonstrate the library’s ability to change and broaden its perspective in the kinds of skills and forms of information Pitt wants to be “supporting students, faculty and researchers with at the University.”
A collaboration with the Center for Teaching and Learning, the Open Lab is a “makerspace” dedicated to inspiring and facilitating innovation in teaching and learning at the University through emerging technologies such as augmented and virtual reality equipment, laser-cutting machines and 3D printers. The lab was expanded in 2022 from a small space on the library’s ground floor.
Its stated mission is to “provide the support and resources necessary for anyone in the Pitt community to incorporate emerging technologies into their teaching,” while providing a supportive environment for Pitt community members to “engage in exploratory learning through creating.”
Exploring new dimensions
By 2014, many Pitt constituencies were working in digital media and emerging technologies like virtual and augmented reality and 3D models. The trend extended to older-school materials, as interest increased in digitizing print material and manipulating information via computer.
In response, Hillman leaders began to develop the Digital Scholarship Services Unit, which provided a suite of data-focused supports.
“And we weren't doing this just because we thought it was a good idea,” Brenner said. “These were things we were hearing directly from faculty and students — that there were gaps in the kind of existing support, or they needed resources, whether it's software equipment that was sometimes too expensive for them to purchase themselves.
“So very much, this fits into the history of the kinds of centralized resources that libraries have been able to provide,” he added.
As at other research-based libraries, the impetus for the Open Lab started with a push toward digitizing library collections from Hillman’s print holdings. This was largely done in-house, after gathering related expertise and equipment related to digitization.
“We also realized that … students and faculty have the need for the same kind of equipment and support digitizing their own material for their own research and learning,” Brenner explained. “So we began to offer some user-facing digitization services in Hillman Library,” including what he called specialized digitization “beyond the kind of public self-service scanners where you might just put a book or a paper down.
“These are for large-format things, special formats, fragile materials, etc.”
Brenner said Zach Horton, assistant professor in the Department of English and associate professor of film and media studies, wanted to integrate 3D-printing into his curriculum, with scanners and support staff regularly available for students. That led to developing what was then called the Digital Stewardship Lab to offer 3D scanning and other specialized services.
With the Centers for Teaching and Learning simultaneously working on its Open Lab project, based on educational technology through experiential learning, the center and the library chose to capitalize on their common goals.
With Hillman Library’s reach to a broad population of students and educators, “we decided very early on that rather than pursue these separate, perhaps parallel (and) duplicative efforts, it made a lot more sense to join together in a partnership,” Brenner said.
Now almost 10 years later, that partnership has taken many stages and forms. “We're very, very proud and happy about where it has come. … Open Lab and similar kinds of experiential and hands-on, but also technology-focused places and experiences and expertise, (are) very much a core part of the library today.”
Open Lab Manager Aaron Graham said that his and his Center for Teaching and Learning colleagues’ tech-oriented backgrounds led to the collaboration with the University Library System.
“It's been very successful,” Graham said of the Open Lab partnership.
The Teaching Center provides most staff for the makerspace including a tech specialist and newly created curriculum coordinator position to “balance the sort of pedagogical side with the tech side, and really start to integrate those together.”
Providing much of the frontline support are 12 “really outstanding” student-staff members who Graham called “the lifeblood of what we do.”
“(They) also bring a lot of their personalities and interests into what we do, and a lot of our public offerings,” he added.
Welcoming environment
Part of creating the desired atmosphere of “serious fun,” Graham said, while creating a community involves lowering “the bar to entry” to those less comfortable with some of the equipment. “Making people feel welcome and seen and like they belong is part of what we do,” he said, noting the colorful printed frog “mascot” created by an Open Lab student who graduated.
“For months, we were finding frogs (taped on) doors … and in cabinets and things,” and became an “unofficial mascot,” Graham noted, whose likeness is included in slide presentations “as a little inside joke, so you see the frogs popping up throughout.”
In the presentation, Graham also showed a slide of a 3D-printed animal skull print that’s used as a classroom teaching tool.
“We produce these for them, and then they take them to class,” he explained, noting that students can engage with skulls they might normally not be able to touch because they're too fragile. “We can mass produce these models … and they can actually use them as a teaching tool.”
Another slide reveals the lab’s 3D area, including re-creations of ancient Rome used by faculty and students in the Architectural Studies Program. Along with Google Earth, the models allow headset-wearing students to virtually visit the streets of Rome.
“So they're immersed in this environment,” he said, with the instructor “walking them through what the architecture means, what's real, what's re-created.”
In an effort to create a collaborative community “where people feel welcome,” the lab offers online training with staff on hand to help, “so people can access what we do here, just by visiting the lab,” Graham said.
The lab also offers community-focused workshops and elective classes to teach skills to navigate the lab’s services.
Building confidence
Molly Ritter, Open Lab curriculum coordinator, works in a newly created outreach role to ensure faculty, staff and students know about the lab while providing instructional support to help faculty incorporate emerging technologies and hands-on learning into their teaching.
“Just by virtue of being in the lab all the time, I do wind up working with students directly on occasion, but mostly I contribute to background work of getting faculty engaged so their students can reap the benefits of learning through critical making,” Ritter said, following the Library Committee presentation. “The self-efficacy, innovation and problem-solving skills that they can develop — not to mention the failure resiliency — will be critical in helping them navigate both their academic careers and an increasingly competitive job market after graduation.”
Faculty also benefit from creating teaching aids with which students can engage.
“We can do that behind the scenes, and then (offer) project support,” Graham said. When a faculty member assigns a project, “we're here to help support that, either by doing the training and assisting with design elements, assisting with the production or through … tracking using virtual reality and things like that.”
Of the lab’s innovative tools, Graham called the bank of 3D printers — including the cheaper filament printing and the more expensive resin printing — “one of our core resources.”
“The equipment access is free. The training is free. Importantly, I think, the materials are free,” he said. “And we don't differentiate between class projects and personal projects, basically.”
Users can take a 3D scan of an object, up to the size of a human, put that model into a virtual reality program and make a 3D print of it. “You can just save it for posterity’s sake,” he said.
The printers also offer laser cutting and engraving options. “That's about taking (two-dimensional) designs and cutting them into a variety of different materials.”
Graham described the lab’s handheld CNC router, a “really amazing piece of technology” that allows you to “very precisely, but with your hand, make large scale cuts to a variety of materials,” he said, with vinyl cutting being among the “gateway” tasks for new users. “You can make stickers (and) iron-ons for shirts and things like that.
“We've got a lot of club activities coming in to make merch, and then they start to see themselves in the space and feel comfortable in it, and then start to think about what else they can do with our Open Lab tools.”
Ritter said her favorite aspect of working in the lab is seeing the confidence grow in student staff and regular members.
“They may start out unsure of themselves and intimidated by the equipment, but after a working through the iterative process of making something — an arcade game, a neon sign, accessibility buggies, for instance — they come to realize how capable and powerful they can be,” she said. “Their creativity and perseverance is incredibly inspiring to me, because all they need are the tools and the space to experiment, fail and try again.
“I like to imagine what an incredible society we would have,” she added, “if this was afforded to every student.”
Shannon O. Wells is a writer for the University Times. Reach him at shannonw@pitt.edu.
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