2025 was a productive year for the Tech Innovations team. Formed in 2023 as part of the Library’s Strategic Plan and service optimization efforts, Tech Innovations is a small but skilled team that manages the library’s patron-facing technology spaces and services.
booth at Bay Area Science Festival
Initially, this included equipment loan, multimedia content creation support, shared computers and computer classroom management, and oversight of other shared technologies like conference rooms.
In early 2025, the Makers Lab at UCSF was integrated into the Tech Innovations team, which has strengthened our operational capacity.
As the bridge between patrons and many of the library’s technological services, we are privileged to work with people from across the UCSF landscape on a variety of projects and topics. In 2025, we successfully responded to 623 patron requests for help! Highlights from each service area are provided below.
Makers Lab
The popularity of the Makers Lab continues to grow, and we enjoy working with researchers and learners on an evolving queue of innovative and interesting project ideas. In addition to project work, our staff collaborated with the UCSF Department of Anatomy to lead a winter 3D printing elective course for students, hosted a booth at a local science festival, and were featured in several publications. This year:
- Over 1,972 3D model parts were manufactured
- 26 students from the School of Dentistry completed the Advanced 3D Printing for Health Science Students course (Anatomy 170.10)
- Two publications featured Makers Lab as project collaborators
- 14 of our collaborations with health sciences educators, researchers, and creatives were highlighted in our Meet the Maker news posts, including Ruth Tabancay and Michelle Memran from the library’s Artist in Residence program.
- Over 400 youth visited the Makers Lab booth and were introduced to 3D printing technology at the Bay Area Science Festival in October.
To see more of the Makers Lab’s projects, check us out on Instagram!
Multimedia and audio visual
The library’s multimedia service point offers free services dedicated to serving students and faculty from UCSF’s academic programs. This includes on site access to media production software, video and audio equipment for loan, and a recording studio to help academic programs create professional-quality instructional videos and podcasts. We also collaborate with campus partners to maintain and update library conference rooms and mediated classrooms. This year:
- 101 equipment items were loaned
- Multimedia production apps were updated and made freely available in Room CL240 at the Kalmanovitz Library:
- Adobe Creative Cloud (full suite)
- Audacity
- Camtasia
- Blender
- Davinci Resolve
- and more!
- The Library Recording Studio (CL 245) launched in 2025 giving faculty, staff, and students expanded capacity to create educational video content for academic programs.
- The FAMRI Library Classroom (CC 151), a hyflex teaching space at Mission Bay designed to support data sciences instruction, has been updated and will be opening soon.
IT systems
The library provides shared computer workstations for UCSF and public patrons at several locations, including the Kalmanovitz Library, the Clinical Sciences Building, the FAMRI Library, and The Hub within Mission Hall. We also collaborate with several partners like UCSF IT and Campus Life Services to maintain shared printers and digital displays in our spaces.
Did you know the library provides access to statistical analysis applications? In 2025 we refined and updated our offerings in collaboration with the Research Analysis Environment (RAE) team, and offer several applications on shared computers, including:
- ArcGIS mapping and geography software
- R, and R Studio workspace for statistics, data analysis, and making graphs
- Stata/BE statistical software for mid-sized data sets
- SPSS statistical software
- We maintained 123 computer workstations and supported 126 events (with 2,932 attendees) in our computer classrooms, including high-stakes exams and training events.
- Four laptop stations were added to our spaces, allowing students, staff, and faculty to work on their personal devices with a secondary monitor, full keyboard, and mouse.
Looking ahead
As we look ahead to 2026, we are excited to continue refining our unit’s services to align with the needs of our patrons, while promoting resource efficiency. This includes updating library webpages and Help Center articles to guide patrons through the most common uses of our tools and services.
In the coming months, we will replace aged Windows workstations in library computer labs, implement new cable management techniques and identify impactful use-cases in the recording studio to enhance the teaching and learning process in our academic programs. We also continue to work on plans to build a cutting-edge, Tech Innovations Hub space on campus, in alignment with the Library’s Strategic Plan.
Thank you to our collaborators across UCSF for a productive 2025. We are excited to collaborate and innovate with you in 2026!