“Look What I Did!”

Can you hear the hard work, the mistakes, the learning, the struggles, and finally the pride and confidence that comes with the success of making something? “Look what I did!” is what we hear a lot at Decatur Makers and it’s the reason we do what we do. We are in the business of empowering our community to be curious problem-solvers through hands-on exploration, inspiration, and innovation to positively impact their lives and our communities.

Would you consider making a donation to support our End-of-Year campaign and help change people’s lives?
We’re running our fundraising campaign through the end of 2019 with a goal of raising $15,000 by December 31 (oh, what a Happy New Year it will be!) Your support would be greatly appreciated! Truly, we’ll be dancing and singing over here!

The focus of our campaign is getting more people of all ages creating and learning by building and making. But we’re not just about the making of things, we’re about making a difference. Making fosters life-changing experiences where kids and adults find passions, learn hard skills, and develop and strengthen the soft skills of problem-solving and critical thinking. This type of success positively impacts people of all ages by empowering them in all areas of their life.

You can make a difference!

It all started with an idea in 2012: local Decatur kids needed a place for their robotics teams to practice. A few parents, prompted by Founders Garrett Goebel and Lew Lefton, took it a step further and thought a place where kids and adults could use tools and work together to build things, share knowledge, and explore all kinds of learning would be a great resource for our community.

They definitely were on to something.

We just celebrated our 7th birthday of the official beginning of our community on Nov 7, 2019; At the core of all we do is our amazingly creative, innovative, and supportive people with all kinds of crazy ideas and skills.

Today, our membership has grown to over 340 makers, including 20 needs-based scholarship memberships.

Plus, in the last 12 months:

Our hands-on STEAM programming reached almost 1500 kids and teachers,

• We’ve offered almost 350 classes and workshops (all open to the public)
• We’ve partnered with over 40 schools and organizations across Atlanta (many supporting underserved youth)
• We’ve developed dozens of organizational partners with whom we collaborate on various projects in Atlanta,
• We’ve connected dozens of makers to STEM job opportunities in the Atlanta area,
• We’ve seen dozens of entrepreneurs and small business owners start or grow their ideas inside our space,
• We’ve been preparing a workforce skills development program,
• We’ve grown our available equipment and included new intro classes on how to use them,
• And this with 2 full-time paid employees and a small army of volunteers making it all happen.
• We’ve come a long way from those first awesome Founders with a great idea.

Now, add to this our plans for:

• becoming a regional hub for youth and teacher maker-led outreach,
• further growing our cache of equipment and tools,
• sharing more classes and workshops,
• supporting our entrepreneurs and small business owners in more ways,
• kicking off workforce development programs,
• and overall increased community involvement (we see so many new opportunities!)

You can see we are stretching ourselves. We have BIG DREAMS and could use a little help to empower the people of all ages who are served by our organization.

It’s our community of members who are the heart of what we do as they share their skills and expertise ranging from engineering, art, design, coding, woodworking, metal working, textiles, science, 3D printing, and so much more. Throw in the physical tools and equipment needed to make stuff all under one roof, and you have the people and place to change people’s lives!

Wondering how your donation (no amount too small!) would make a difference?

• $10 would buy an Arduino Gemma (a mini wearable microcontroller)
• $25 would buy 1 Kg PLA filament for 3D printing
• $50 would sponsor the materials for one of our Family Build Nights
• $100 would buy a nice quality cordless drill
• $300 would sponsor the materials for 6 months of Outreach with one of our partner organizations who support underserved youth
• $540 would sponsor two needs-based 12 month membership scholarships with all the benefits
• $1000 would buy 1/2 of a metal milling machine
• $75,000 would buy a full-building air filtration system (can’t hurt to ask, right?)

The positive impact that making has on kids and adults is life-changing! That’s why we’re asking for your support.

Click here to make a donation

You’ll make a difference by changing lives, and be able to say, “Look what I did!”