One of my favorite things about Maker Faire is the young makers. If you ever needed assurance that the next generation is up to the challenge that life presents, a visit to Maker Faire will put your mind at ease. Kids steeped in making bring a unique viewpoint and skill set to the world that says: “I can do this. And if I don’t know how I can figure it out.”
One of the standouts is 12-year-old Quin, or Qtechknow as he goes by. I worked with Quinn to get his FuzzBot project onto MAKE, but met him for the first time at Maker Faire Bay Area last month. He was there with his folks to show off some his projects and give a presentation on Maker Faire’s “meet the maker stage.” MAKE Editor-at-Large Mark Fraunfelder has worked with Quin before teaching an Arduino class and he’s equally impressed with his poise and knowledge.
Mark and I joked after Quin’s presentation that when we were 12 years old we spent our time sitting on the couch watching reruns of Gilligan’s Island. Building robots and creating a line of electronics was not something I could have imagined doing when I was a kid. Quinn, however, it making much better use of his time and it’s inspiring to see what he comes up with next.
Here’s the talk he gave at Maker Faire entitled “My Open Source Education.” The audio isn’t great, but it’s worth watching:
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