How to organise an event at Makespace

How to run an event

There are several things to think about if you want to run an event:

• What the event is
• Who attends [age range, necessary experience]
• Who is running it - course designer, other presenters/enablers, and any additional staff (first aiders, fire marshals, etc) who might be needed
• Whether there’s any need to charge attendees
  (for example for materials or to cover speaker expenses)
• Whether any special equipment might be needed
  (eg consumables such as lots of bits of wood, or more significant items such as Arduinos, or possibly a need to pre-book the 3D printer to make sure other jobs aren't running on it and so on)
• When the event might happen
  (considering audience demographics, other events in Cambridge, Makespace bookings and so on)
• How we publicise it (target audience, publicity method) - remember, a badly attended event can be depressing for everyone!
• Whether prebooking is needed
  (for instance if the event has restricted space but may be popular, or if you can only train a certain number of people, or there's only a certain number of Arduinos available, or whatever)
• Whether repeat attendance is likely (eg a course over several nights)
• What you will do if something goes wrong
  (for example, if far too many people turn up, or a vital bit of equipment breaks just before the event)
• How you'll know who came along
  (this is *vital* because Makespace receives funds based on public engagement, so we need to track who does activities in the space and for how long)
• Whether there's any specific risk assessment or health and safety preparation needed

At the moment we expect only Full Members (£40/month, inc Founders) will be allowed to organise events. You'll need to book the space in advance in some way and if you are an event organiser you are RESPONSIBLE for making sure that the event follows our safety rules and so on.