Help Fund the SparkTruck Documentary

By Nathan Young on April 12, 2013

This is something amazing. Last Summer, through the help of Kickstarter, a group of Stanford design school (d.school) students got a truck and some equipment and spread their love of making with kids across America. Together they covered 15,323 miles, 33 states, 73 locations, and 2,697 students. Now the group is preparing for their second trip across the country with more Stanford students getting involved! Here is a video from their YouTube channel TheSparkTruck of a school presentation!

Eugene Korsunskiy, Jason Chua, Duygu (Didi) Erucman, Rachel Star, Aaron Peck, Kathayoon Khalil, Prat Ganapathy, and Diane Lee are all part of the first SparkTruck team. The team have been featured on multiple media sources across the country. And these people have inspired many kids across the country. Here is a video when the team got to speak at a TEDx event.

SparkTruck went to many places across the country last Summer and inspired kids to be creative. The truck had several high-tech tools like a laser cutter, two 3-D printers, a vinyl cutter, sewing machines and a clay oven. The truck also had a lot of low-tech tools like hammers, scissors, hot glue guns, tape, and various craft supplies. The kids got to watch the laser cutters and 3-D printers do their work. And then the kids got to make a lot of things with arts and crafts supplies. SparkTruck runs hands-on workshops with elementary and middle school students; promotes design thinking as a problem solving skill; and, encourages kids to find their inner maker. Anything to get kids inspired to make creative things is cool!

Now SparkTruck is wanting to make a documentary of their first trip last Summer. And they are going through Kickstarter to make that happen. The Kickstarter campaign only has less than 48 hours to raise the $8,000 needed to be funded. As of 5 pm central on April 12th, the campaign only has raised $7,350. I really don’t want this campaign to fail only a few hundred dollars short. The documentary would show people all about SparkTruck. And as a new bunch of d.school students are preparing for the next iteration of the epic educational road trip this Summer. This documentary would help expose more kids and adults to this great project!

Here’s hoping SparkTruck will make a visit to the Anniston/Oxford Alabama area this Summer! To learn more about the SparkTruck documentary Kickstarter project and to pledge money go to: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jasonchua/sparktruck-stories-from-a-cross-country-maker-jour

Learn more about SparkTruck at: http://sparktruck.org/. Follow them on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/sparktruck and on Twitter @SparkTruck