creative space ramblings

Amazing what a SPARK can do

We started this program, this experience, this…not sure what “it” really is. Since “no-name” was taken the kids came up with “SPARK” Here’s the vision in a paragraph or two.

The idea was “Sparked” in a conversation one day at the Creative Space. I’ve had this idea for years to start some sort of alternative learning program.

Bill Trayling and I met one day out of the blue and we shared similar visions.

Bill said we should talk to Jan Olson.

Jan said he had a class that would be perfect.

That class then inspired 2 other classes.

We met with Mark, Tim and Leslie.

A week later we launched with 90 kids in the gym at HMES!

The goal of SPARK is to help students see beyond how they’ve been schooled historically and even how society/media has tried to mould them to think abut themselves and the world. We want to help them to open their minds to passionate ideas, their ideas, which can shape the culture around them. The saying goes, “you may not, as one person, change the entire world, but you can change the entire world for one person. Critical thinking is a lost art in this generation of ”go with the flow” do what feels right”. Secondly, we want to help them open their hearts. Our world is a mess. We are taught to look out for #1 and the world starves, dies and our planet degrades. Allowing students to develop compassion is the start of real culture shift. In a sentence - Think deeply, creatively in community and come up with solutions that will make a difference in your neighbour’s world. It’s time to release the creativity and passion in our kids hearts and minds. And hopefully this leads them to doing great things with their lives. The media says “be popular and famous” What the world needs are students who pursue “greatness.” ”Don’t ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and then go do that. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” Harold Thurman Whitman. I believe that “coming alive” is not about students doing want the want, it’s about them doing what makes difference in their lives and the lives around them propelled by how they are wired. It’s time to release the inventors, the artists, the social activists, the scientists, the future moms, the preachers, the teachers, the future dads, etc all fuelled by passion and compassion - and watch the Culture shift.

We will be engaging them using kinetic, audio and visual learning styles.

This is a team effort between Holly Meadows ES, students mentors and The Creative Space. It’s a bit amorphous at the moment, but feel free to follow along with each week by going to www.thecreativespace.ca/spark

The program will culminate in May with an event called IGNITE where selected students will present their ideas in a 20 slide, 5 minute presentation at The Creative Space.

Pricing…keep it simple

I go crossed-eyed looking at some rate chats with the hourly model! That head ache alone is worth any member staying a few hours over their monthly allotments, so we’ve kept is simple. 3 main membership plans and based off our $25/day (membership Fee) + $15/day ongoing

Basic = $25/mth -1 day a month in the space and access to all community events (get’s their feet wet and we hope will translate into the next level of membership)

Every day after that is $15/day (versions of this plan could be a 1 day/wk plan = $75/mth or 2 days per week = $100/mth. Some have applied for these since launching the Basic+day scenario

Lite Membership = $180/mth = 3 days per week

FullTime = $300/mth (27/7) This is the only rate that there’s a better bargain - but we’re re-thinking it now as Alex has said before Full-time Desks takes a desk “off the market” and therefore can only be rented once, as opposed to a flex desk which can be rent 3-4 times over as the membership won’t use that desk at the same time.

I’d encourage y’all to try the Basic Membership. Thanks again to Alex from Indy Hall for the suggestion.

Since we launched the package we’ve seen about a member a week sign up. It’s not big bucks, but most grab it for the year ($275/year - $25 off if they pay for the 12 mths up front) And so the 8 that have signed up so far put $2200 in our bank account. We might see them one month and not the next but they attend our events to network, etc. Well worth the $25

Members can use all meeting space as part of their membership if it’s a client meeting during the day and we just ask that they don’t go over 2 hours per meeting. Some go a bit over, we let it ride and just monitor space usage for all members as to not have one or two monopolize the space.

Meeting space for workshops, classes, clinics and events we charge hourly.

Since The Creative Space is not our full-time job, we have to do everything we can to minimize the overhead and workload for administrating it all.

Here’s a summery of a few of the things we do to minimize the need for costly systems/apps, manpower, etc

SImple membership plans
Google cal for bookings/events
Skype to inform members that ”clients are here” (we have 2 floors so the upstairs peeps need some reception support)
Members help gather trash for trash day and re-supply toiletries when their low. we just make sure the supply rooms are full
Everyone brings indoor shoes or slippers (has cut down our sweeping mopping time drastically, especially during winter months - (Oh Canada - snow, slush, salt)
MadMimi for news blasts

The Mosaic of Coworking

In response to the “Regus invented coworking” threads. And inspired by Alex’s post here.

About 7 years ago when I moved back to Barrie I worked in Suite Works. A cool new business center with all the gears and gadgets and was an environmental blend of Starbucks/Ikea. I liked it. Their main marketing message was “distributed work” and “stop commuting” After starting The Creative Space I immediately saw how different we were. What didn’t change was my relationship with the owner who was passionate about changing the way we think about work. In our business plan it was hard to find competition in our area and only SuiteWorks came close, yet we see each other as models offering different flavours to our customers.

Since TCS started we’ve noticed SW changing their message and their service offerings to be more in line with what we all were doing. The owner said to me a couple weeks ago, “you guys did it right.” At the same time, we still appeal to different markets and we refer members to each other. As much as I’m still weary of the Regus movement on a few levels, I agree that there is room for these models within the coworking movement and they can respectfully own the term.I like the music analogy. Let’s be passionate about our favourite style - wear the cloths, speak the language, pierce the lip, get the tattoo while at the same time be ok with what’s going on elsewhere and even celebrate and learn from them. Remember the movie the Breakfast Club? In the end it was more about celebrating the things they had in common, which had little to do with the outside stuff. Came down to relationships, community, making the world a better place…

Another good way to “see” it is to think, Mosaic. If you look too close at a mosaic piece of art, it can look disjointed, un-aligned and even offer a sense of disharmony, but take a step back…Wow!