Managing a 3D Printing Program is Hard!
Printing student jobs can mean multiple files and versions, emails back and forth, post it notes, excel sheets or worse! Maybe you don’t know what to teach using printing and you end up with nothing but nametags and trinkets all year, and is that aligned to all of the modern standards? Now.. Imagine running a 3D printing program for your entire school! It’s easy to see how some teachers get overwhelmed with printing and go back to more conventional printing methods that they’re comfortable with.
BETTER ACCESS, BETTER ENGAGEMENT, BETTER STUDENT OUTCOMES.
The Polar Cloud entices and drives engagement among students that otherwise might not have been exposed to the opportunity. For students that are interested, the platform accelerates their passion. Better access leads to better engagement and better student outcomes. The features below ensure that your school’s 3D printing program will be a success.
Check out the features below that come along with your Premium School Subscription and help ensure you have a successful 3D Printing program with real tangible and trackable results.
SCHOOL SITE LICENSE FEATURES
SITE-WIDE ACCESS!
Problem Solved: Grant immediate blanket access to your entire student body. Allow other teachers or disciplines to use the 3D printer(s) for their class with ease!
JOB REQUESTS
Problem Solved: Normally a “beginner” or novice student hands off their object to someone to print it for them, and never touches the object again until it is returned to them. There are many unique learning moments in that printing process that the student misses out on.
Using Job Requests means no more emailing STL files back and forth, handing a flash drive to your favorite friend, teacher, or lab manager, or any other means of transporting files.
With job requests, involve those who know little or nothing about 3D Printing and part preparation in the process. Do your students design a part and then not see or handle it again until they have the finished print in their hands? We believe there are many crucial learning moments that happen between these parts (sizing and spacial awareness, object orientation, understanding of support material, printer state and status, etc.). Involve your students in the process by allowing them to be apart of it.
PREMIUM SLICER (see CANVAS)
Problem Solved: The “one-to-one” style of “Slicing” programs that need to be installed and setup to work on just one computer, for just one 3D Printer. Once students are experienced enough to do so, have them prepare their own jobs for 3D Printing from any device - from a Smartphone, iPad, Chromebook, or Laptop.
NGSS STEAM CURRICULUM AND PROJECTS
Problem Solved: Helping teachers that haven’t implemented 3D printing into their coursework and need NGSS aligned projects to introduce to students of all abilities. Filter by grade level and subject to find exactly what you’d like to teach.
Turn your 3D Printer into more than a nametag and trinket printing machine with Curriculum on the Polar Cloud. You’ll find lesson plans from publishers like STEAMtrax, Makers Empire, and DREMEL, and we’re adding more all the time.
E-COMMERCE! SCHOOL KEEPS 100% OF PROCEEDS
Problem Solved: Champion entrepreneurial drive amongst students and fundraise to replace consumables used by the 3D printer.
Students on the Polar Cloud get to explore STEM related fields while using 3D design and modeling. The iterative nature of 3D printing boosts problem solving skills and helps develop the workforce of tomorrow.
REALTIME EMAIL & TEXT NOTIFICATIONS
Problem Solved: When your school’s 3D printers are printing around the hour, there are many people with a vested interest in the results!
If the print fails, it’s important to know right away so that you can address the failure. If an entire tray of student 3D prints complete, those students need to be notified. Doing so manually can be difficult and time consuming, especially across multiple classes or grades!
ADVANCED REPORTING
Problem Solved: When you complete a semester, there are no resulting logs or data that help you answer the simple question, how did we do? How much (or little) did we 3D print? Did some students print way more than others? How much did we spend on filament?
Just design and print as you normally would, and learn more from Polar Cloud Reports on your School’s performance.
MAGIC ESTIMATOR TOOL
Problem Solved: Know how much your print will cost, how long it will take, and if you have enough filament left on the spool to print it! If nothing else, these metrics are fun for students to see and helps them better understand the real life impact of the design choices they make.
PRINT HISTORY
Problem Solved: The Polar Cloud keeps track of everything that gets printed on your printer. Use this info to re-queue an old job that where don’t have the object any more, see whose accessing your printer outside of work/school hours, or count your # of successful prints!
PRINTER TIMELAPSES!
Problem Solved: The printer puts in hours of hard work.. and who is there to see it? No one! Timelapse videos are a great way for the student to check back in on the printing process, share their object with others, and more!
DEDICATED HELP
Problem Solved: Once activated, your School Site License is managed by a dedicated Account Manager to help you with any questions you may have throughout your use. Initial onboarding consults are scheduled via Zoom/Meet to get all printers and teachers set up on the cloud.
