This is the third edition of the Fab Academy Diploma, the main educational program of the Fab Lab Network, offered by labs in the world, the biggest existing university in this planet.

The Fab Academy offers a 6 month program on digital fabrication, and it could be taken in any of the participating labs listed here

The Fab Academy 2012 program could be found here: Fab Academy content site

For last year’s academy labs and projects go here: Fab Academy participating labs 2011

The Fab Academy offers Certificates on relevant technical topics, and a Diploma aimed at vocational and technical training for employment and investment (along with assistance to its graduates in those areas).These are accredited by the Fab Academy; it is anticipated that they will by followed by a Bachelor’s degree to be offered under applicable regional accreditation, along with post-graduate study.

Fab Academy Certificates provide familiarity with technical options and capabilities, hands-on experience, and direction for further study. Each requires, and is evaluated by, developing and documenting projects. They are periodically renewed to reflect best practices. The Certificates typically require 1-2 weeks. They are combined in the Diploma, which is roughly comparable to completing MIT’s rapid-prototyping course “How To Make (almost) Anything”. Progress is evaluated by skills and projects rather than time or credits.

Following an initial trial in 2008, the Fab Academy accepted the first Diploma students in the Fall of 2009. Admission is limited by available space, and based on balancing the students’ backgrounds, interests, and experience, as well as project portfolios. Fab Academy tuition is priced to cover the local costs of instruction, facilities, and materials, as well as global capacity. Where possible, support is sought for needs-based tuition assistance. The Fab Academy application is available here.

Boot Camp Fab Lab Barcelona. January 2011

Ten days (or one week) crash course in fab lab tools and processes by the gurus of the fab lab network. For new fab lab managers, teachers, and people who want a fast training course.

The Boot Camp is a short duration workshop on Fab Lab management, processes and project development. The goal of Boot Camps is to offer short term training for future Lab Managers, fabricators and creators around the world. The Boot Camp is developed by the Fab Labs in the worldwide network, provided with equipment and tutors dedicated (almost) 24/7 for an intense workshop on Digital Fabrication.

Boot Camp is offered in two different formats:

- Fab Lab Tools and Processes crash course. January 9th to 18th
- Fab Lab Management and installation. June 18th to 24th

The winter Boot Camp (Jan 9th to 18th) will take place simultaneously in Barcelona, Amsterdam, Detroit, Norway, Iceland, and many other sites to be confirmed. The entire Boot Camp 2011 program could be found here: LINK. The tuition fee will be determined locally, which would include tutorials, materials and access to machines and lab equipment.

For questions regarding Boot Camp, please contact us at: coordination@fabacademy.org

APPLY

15 Labs around the world shared the last 6 months on projects from Circuit production to Furniture design. More than 8 countries such as Iceland, Kenya, the Netherlands, Spain or United States participated in the second edition of the newly created academy, directed by Neil Gershenfeld and supported by the Fab Lab Network.

Join us at:http://mcu.cba.mit.edu/ID: 1

Or check in your local lab:

- Providence
- Amsterdam
- Barcelona
- Urbana
- Vestmannaeyjar
- Soshanguve
- NASA
- Century College
- Incite Focus – Detroit
- Lima
- FabLabDC
- Toulouse
- Nairobi
- TIE Project Boston
- Manchester

Please check the evolution of people’s projects at the following list of participating labs:

• Providence
• Amsterdam
• Barcelona
• Urbana
• Vestmannaeyjar
• Soshanguve
• NASA
• Century College
• Incite Focus – Detroit
• Lima
• FabLabDC
• Toulouse
• Nairobi
• TIE Project Boston
• Manchester, UK

50 Participants from 14 different sites. The Fab Academy 2011 has started on January 19th, 3pm Barcelona, 9am Boston, 6am California, 11pm Japan. Students from countries such as South Africa, United States, Iceland, Netherlands, Peru and Spain are participating in the Diploma Program offered by the worldwide network of Fab Labs.

The Fab Academy is a distributed education program, the campus is the planet, and classrooms are in the Fab Labs, where also lies the subject content of digital manufacturing, its implications and applications.

Students will be encouraged to follow a 6 month intensive program on all digital fabrication techniques and tools, which will be embeded in final projects to be presented on June 2011.

January 10- 14, 2010
One week crash course in fab lab tools and processes by the gurus of the fab lab network.  For new fab lab managers, teachers, and people who want a fast training course.

Participating labs:

AS220 Fab Lab  in Providence, Rhode Island, USA  (contact Shawn Wallave / shawn [at] AS220 [dot] org)
Lorrain County Community College Fab Lab in Elyria, Ohio, USA (contact Scott  Zitek /
Barcelona Fab Lab in Barcelona, Spain  (contact Tomas Diez / tomasdiez [at] iaac [dot] net)
Solvik Gard Fab Lab in Lyngen, Norway (contact Haakon or Jorgen Karlsen,  jorgen [at] fablab [dot] no , haakon [at] fablab [dot] no)
Vestmannaeyjar  Fab Lab in Iceland (contact Frosti Gíslason, frosti [at] nmi [dot] is )

Price of attending is determined by the local fab lab.   Plan to pay a tuition as well as transportation and living expenses.

The week-long, intensive course will cover:

1A day of 2D Design & Fabrication plus documentation

2A day of 3D design, molding and casting

3A day on ShopBot, plus start electronics and documentation(collaborative project management, version control —mercurial)

4Electronics continuesand integrated final project work

5A day of overall lab considerations (management, business, networking, IT, etc.)

Presentation of final project tonetwork.

Applications are open until December 24th. Please check application procedure HERE

The Fab Academy provides instruction and supervises investigation of mechanisms, applications, and implications of digital fabrication.

Just as communications and computation went from analog to digital, resulting in PCs and the Internet, the digitization of fabrication is leading to personal fabricators that will allow anyone to make almost anything, anywhere. The development of digital fabrication is based on creating codes that don’t just describe things, they are things, much as proteins are coded in molecular biology.

This research roadmap is ultimately aiming at a Star Trek-style replicator, but prototype versions of these capabilities are already available in field “fab labs“.

Fab labs began as an outreach project from MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms (CBA), and spread around the world. The Fab Academy was launched to provide access to advanced instruction for students in these labs exceeding the educational resources locally available to them. It links groups of students and instructors in fab labs, with online video collaboration and lectures by a global faculty. Unlike remote instruction from a central campus, the digital fabrication tools in a fab lab effectively allow the campus to come to the student, for distributed rather than distance education.

The Fab Academy offers Certificates on relevant technical topics, and a Diploma aimed at vocational and technical training for employment and investment (along with assistance to its graduates in those areas).These are accredited by the Fab Academy; it is anticipated that they will by followed by a Bachelor’s degree to be offered under applicable regional accreditation, along with post-graduate study.

Fab Academy Certificates provide familiarity with technical options and capabilities, hands-on experience, and direction for further study. Each requires, and is evaluated by, developing and documenting projects. They are periodically renewed to reflect best practices. The Certificates typically require 1-2 weeks. They are combined in the Diploma, which is roughly comparable to completing MIT’s rapid-prototyping course “How To Make (almost) Anything”. Progress is evaluated by skills and projects rather than time or credits.

Following an initial trial in 2008, the Fab Academy accepted the first Diploma students in the Fall of 2009. Admission is limited by available space, and based on balancing the students’ backgrounds, interests, and experience, as well as project portfolios. Fab Academy tuition is priced to cover the local costs of instruction, facilities, and materials, as well as global capacity. Where possible, support is sought for needs-based tuition assistance. The Fab Academy application is available here.

The Fab Academy is directed by Neil Gershenfeld, produced by Vicente Guallart and Sherry Lassiter, and coordinated by Tomas Diez. Fab Academy faculty who are leaders in their respective fields provide global video lectures, supervise academic content, and guide research. Hands-on instruction in the labs is provided by instructors who supervise and evaluate Certificates, develop and disseminate instructional material, and assist with projects.

The schedule for the Spring of 2011 will be:

• boot camp (Jan 10-14)
• digital fabrication principles and practices (Jan 19)
• collaborative technical development, documentation, and project management (Jan 26)
• computer-aided design, manufacturing, and modeling (Feb 2):
• computer-controlled cutting (Feb 9)
• electronics production (Feb 16)
• computer-controlled machining (Feb 23)
• electronics design (Mar 2)
• 3D molding and casting (Mar 9)
• embedded programming (Mar 16)
• 3D scanning and printing (Mar 23)
• interface and application programming (Mar 30)
• input devices (Apr 6)
• composites (Apr 13)
• output devices (Apr 20)
• embedded networking and communications (Apr 27)
• machine design Wed (May 4)
• digital fabrication applications and implications (May 11)
• invention, intellectual property, and business models (May 18)
• digital fabrication project development (May 25)
• final project presentations (June 1)

Global lectures happen on Wednesdays at 9:00 on the US East Coast (ranging from 6:00 on the West Coast to 23:00 in Japan), with lab sections at the same time on Mondays and Fridays.

The Fab Academy will be differed from October 2010 to January 19th 2011. According to the network plans, some of the new participating labs need to be setup and prepared for another year of the Academy. Program’s structure will be re-defined but keeping the essentials on the most complete program in Digital Fabrication principles, implications and applications.

Fab Academy 2011 key points are:

- Start date is January 19th, final class  June 1st.
– There are going to be 20 topics (units/certificates) to cover. The two week cycle will now be a ONE week cycle, with more topics than previous year (16), but adjusted for content complexity. 
– The lectures will take place the same day of the week (Wednesday), and same time (9:00am Boston Time). We will keep the lab sections on Mondays and Fridays, which will be led by tutors at every lab, and will be offered online through the video conference.
– Lab confirmation deadline is December 15th.
– Application deadline for students is December 28th.

Fab Academy previous projects can be found at:

- Fab Lab Providence at AS220
– Fab Lab Barcelona at IaaC
– Fab Lab Shoshenguve in South Africa
– Fab Lab Iceland

To apply please download the application form at: http://fabacademy.org/index.php/form, and send it full filled to: coordination@fabacademy.org

Fab Academy previous projects can be found at:

- Fab Lab Providence at AS220
- Fab Lab Barcelona at IaaC
- Fab Lab Shoshenguve in South Africa
- Fab Lab Iceland