EL3vate 2026 · Day 8 · 29 July

Prototyping solutions

Fifteen disciplines, fifteen assignments. Each one has something students make with their hands, something they build with AI, and a plan that fits inside a real semester — now with a 90-minute version, a rubric, a budget, and a real annotated model output for each.

Tim Lum · AI Innovation Team Director · PACE, Shidler College of Business · University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

How to use this site

Find your field. Start with Try it Tuesday — a 90-minute version you can run this week with no prep beyond reading the page. When you have more room, the multi-week plan — four weeks for most disciplines, five where the physical build depends on an earlier week’s output — and the one-semester version are there too.

Nothing here needs you to learn a tool first. The physical builds go through PACE as a service: students submit a file, we fabricate it. The AI builds happen in a chat window, and every page shows a real model output with its failures marked.

What PACE provides

  • 3D printingFree for UH faculty. Students submit an .stl file; we print and return it.
  • Laser cuttingCut and engrave in acrylic, wood and paper stock. Same file-submission model.
  • Hana studioRecording space for podcasts, oral assessments and recorded role-play.
  • TurnaroundPlan on 7–10 business days — about two calendar weeks — from file to finished part. Build that into your dates.
  • Submitting a fileFabrication files are submitted through the PACE request form, from a UH email address. Ask Tim Lum at PACE for the form link and pass it to your students.
  • In-person accessVisiting the space in person is currently by appointment. That is separate from submitting a file — nobody has to come in to have something made.
  • ContactTim Lum, PACE · pace.shidler.hawaii.edu/maker

Cut sheet · 15 parts · one per discipline

Part 01 / 15

Political Science

For the challenge named in this cohort: getting entrepreneurship into political theory without it feeling bolted on.

Make · Laser cut · engraveBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 02 / 15

Entrepreneurship

The business model canvas from Day 4 stays theoretical until a stranger holds the thing and says no.

Make · 3D print · laser cutBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 03 / 15

Law

Assessment that an AI cannot sit for: the student has to speak, be interrupted, and recover.

Make · Hana recording studioBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 04 / 15

Comparative Philosophy

The AI is the object of study, not the tool. Students are graded on catching where it flattens a tradition.

Make · Laser cut · engraveBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 05 / 15

Marketing / Strategic Communication

Students generate ten campaigns in an hour, then have to defend why nine of them are bad.

Make · 3D print · laser cutBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 06 / 15

Nutrition & Dietetics

Counseling practice at volume, plus a teaching tool students can hand to an actual community group.

Make · 3D printBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 07 / 15

Urban Planning

A physical model changes a community meeting more than any rendering does.

Make · Laser cut · layeredBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 08 / 15

Learning Design & Technology

Build the learning object, then audit it for accessibility before anyone sees it.

Make · 3D print · laser cutBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 09 / 15

Bioinformatics

The structure in your hand answers a question the rotating model on screen does not.

Make · 3D printBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 10 / 15

English Literature

The strongest case for humanities in an AI world is a student demonstrating exactly where the machine reads badly.

Make · Hana recording studioBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 11 / 15

Finance

Students build the model in ten minutes, so the class time goes to arguing about the assumptions.

Make · Laser cut · engraveBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 12 / 15

Marriage & Family Therapy

Reps. Students get twenty practice intakes instead of two, before they ever sit with a person.

Make · Laser cut · Hana studioBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 13 / 15

Teacher Education

Pre-service teachers design for a real K–12 partner classroom and get told what did not work.

Make · 3D print · laser cutBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 14 / 15

Family Business / Management

Succession conversations are hard to teach because nobody wants to have one out loud.

Make · Laser cut · engraveBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →

Part 15 / 15

Planetary Science

For the stated goal of restoring curiosity in advanced courses: give them terrain they can run a hand across.

Make · 3D printBuild · AI chat · no code

Open assignment →