The Shop is a space to take care of
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This space is yours, but it also belongs to everyone else in the community regardless of their position in the college or the major they plan to leave with.
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Your project is never more important than your physical safety. If you believe there is a chance that an operation, the space, or you yourself may not be safe, for any reason, ask for help. The Shop has vast resources, and there is likely a better way to do it and/or someone to show you how.
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No one has an exclusive right to the tools/resources in The Shop.
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Always clean up after yourself and leave the space the way it should be: clean and ready to be used by someone else.
The Shop is a learning space
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Admit when you don’t know how to do something and ask for help. If an operation goes wrong that you were confident in, ask for help to figure out what happened and to fix anything that was broken. Things break, and you’re not in trouble, but we need to know in order to replace the object, identify why it broke, and maintain The Shop for others.
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Everyone comes in with different levels of experience, and most of us came in with no experience at all. We learned what to do, you can too.
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Even if you’ve used a machine extensively before coming here, you still have to demonstrate your ability the same way that everyone else does, by training to use our machines the way that we have deemed safe.
Questions are encouraged and welcome
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We learn by asking questions. No one in The Shop will make you feel like you’re asking a dumb question.
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If you know something that someone doesn’t, share what you know in a constructive way. Don’t condescend if someone has yet to learn something.
We celebrate in The Shop
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If you’ve done something well or successfully, great! We want to hear about it, we want to see it work, we might even ask to display it when you’re done using it.
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Fantastic failures can also be learning experiences just as much as successes.
The Shop is an evolving community
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People make The Shop what it is, and now that you are a member of The Shop Community, you have the power and responsibility to perpetuate the improvement and evolution of The Shop.
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What worked for Olin a few years ago might not be the best for Olin now. All aspects of The Shop enumerated here are constantly evolving, and this only happens if the community takes an active role in making change. That means you. You are now also responsible for any future changes to The Shop Community. Make it what you want to see.