"Mathufacturing" a Tiny House - Build

Courses Manufacturing
Content Area(s) Manufacturing, Mathematics
Grades 9,10,11,12

Instructor(s)
Jerry Eaton

School
Alliance HS @ Meek Campus

Description
Finished and ready to roll! Students at Alliance High School (Meek campus) completed this tiny house, now home to a Portland resident who had been camping on the street. The year-long project began with a course called "Mathufacturing" developed by math teachers Miguel Meija and Catherine Ordway and CTE-Manufacturing teacher Jerry Eaton. The class first studied with community partner Jackie Santa Lucia, an architect, educator and co-founder of Your Street Your Voice, a program that teaches young people about architecture and urban planning through an equity lens. Together they explored how math and manufacturing could address social and racial injustice in their community and decided to design tiny houses to address the critical need for housing in Portland. Students applied geometry, algebra, and computer-aided design skills to develop plans and budgets which they presented to a virtual panel of local architects and city planners. "This project made math fun!" said one student as he walked panelists through the design-budget tradeoffs in his spreadsheet. Drawing from students' designs, Eaton and a small group of students used donated materials and construction skills to build a tiny house, delivered just before winter rolled in.
 
Project Length
12 Weeks

Project Deliverables
A Tiny House