Meet the Makers: Amy

Meet the Makers is a series of interviews to help you get to know the awesome folks who are building our makerspace. Amy is an active member and Director who you will frequently spot working on her latest project in the wood shop. Read on to find out about her experience serving on the Board and what keeps her so involved in the making the makerspace awesome.

 

Amy, what’s your role at YuKonstruct?
I am the Secretary of the Board, I attend CORE meetings, and I organise some of our event programming – like the Make it Wild series of workshops. I also help to teach the Wood Shop Orientation sessions.

How did you get involved with YuKonstruct?
Since I first saw the buzz about YuKonstruct, I was completely intrigued. I’ve always loved to make things and a community space dedicated to doing just that is totally up my alley. It took me a little while to get involved to the extent that I wanted to, but showing up to volunteer at community events like the parade float building as well as coming to CORE meetings sure paid off.

What has been your experience on the Board this past year?
I decided to volunteer for the board as I have policy experience so I thought I could contribute in a positive way to this up-and-coming organisation. It has been an eventful year! I have had the pleasure of contributing to some pretty exciting times at YuKonstruct:

• (co)space got up and running – a great adventure and a huge success thanks to so many volunteers.
• We hired the lovely and capable Adria to join our staff team with awesome Logan.
• We worked on documenting some of our policies in the ongoing effort of the policy wiki (doesn’t sound sexy, but to a policy nerd this is excellent stuff).
• We took on strategic planning to really dig into our governance model and planning for the next three years.

If I can quote our fearless and excellent board president, John – being on the board helps to break down barriers so that Makers and Entrepreneurs can do what they do best. I like to feel that I contribute to this excellent community in a meaningful way so, although not without its frustrations, being on the Board has been a rewarding experience.

What advice do you have for other makers in the Yukon?
Come out, join in! There are so many way to contribute to the community, and you get as much as you give.

We have awesome events for members to take part in, our volunteer duties can meet any interest, and did I mention that being a board member is rewarding? Because it is.

What are you working on now?
For my own projects – oh, have I got plans! The Van Slam gave me all sorts of ideas that I want to improve on Goldie – my Rav4 camping car – like installing an expandable kitchen table on rollers. I want to continue learning to use the wood lathe. And I just became an auntie to two more little nephews, so my wooden toy building game really needs to step up. I could go on, but I’ll likely be posting my progress on my instructables account soon.

I’m also really excited to move forward with the holacracy model that we are exploring as a governance structure for YuKonstruct. I love this organisation for its openness and community feeling, so I’m excited to see where we can go in the next few years after all the input we got into our strategic planning process.