Membership

HackPGH is a member-driven organization. We believe strongly in the principle of Do-ocracy and the entire space is maintained by volunteers. If that sounds appealing to you, come join us!

Becoming a Member

Regular membership is $50/month. You'll get an RFID card key for 24/7 access to the shop. Discounted membership is offered for seniors, students, disabled people, and veterans at $30/month. There is also a dual membership for $80/month that is a slight discount over two regular memberships.

To become a member, sign up at at https://hackpgh.org/join/. To get an access key, come to one of the many public events at HackPgh including the members meetings and ask a board member for one. There should be a board member always available at member's meetings, and at open shop tours on Monday and Saturday nights. If you need to set up a time outside that, contact the board by either emailing info@hackpgh.org or asking on Slack.

Unfortunately, members must be at least 18 years old. For some reason, insurance companies really don't like the idea of children and band-saws being part of the same institution, and since we're run by volunteers we can't promise that there will be people around to provide supervision. If parents are members then they are welcome to bring children 6+ though whenever they are present.

There are several other maker spaces in Pittsburgh that are kid-friendly though. In no particular order:

• Assemble PGH: http://assemblepgh.org/
• Children's Museum Makeshop: https://pittsburghkids.org/exhibits/makeshop
• Carnegie Science Center STEM Center: http://www.carnegiesciencecenter.org/stemcenter/

Visitors

You're welcome to visit during public events, including the members meetings or a shop tour, either by contacting the board and scheduling it or by coming to the space during one of the regularly scheduled Open Shop nights, which are currently at 7:30pm on Mondays and Saturdays (or check the calendar at https://hackpgh.org/calendar/ ).

We love meeting cool people. Previous visitors have included traveling artists, school robotics teams, STEM education workshops from Zimbabwe, all sorts of cool stuff. All we ask is that you let people know on social media or whatever how awesome we are.  ;-) Though sticking a donation in the donation box is always welcome.

Contract Work

HackPGH itself does not generally take commissions or projects as an entity; we've done it a few times and it's seldom gone well. We aren't organized to be a contract shop and most members are here to have fun, not work for other people. That said, it does happen. What you need to do is find one or more individual members who are willing to help out.

To do this, you can email info@hackpittsburgh.org and we can pass on your request in our member chatroom channel, or come to a member's meeting and make a pitch.

What we NEED is a mailing list people can post to for that sort of thing and easily connect to members who might be interested, but we don't have one yet.