A collection of zines by 13 students with the Emma S. Barrientos Mexican American Cultural Center Caminos program and an on-site kids zone presented by the Pflugerville Library are some of the new offerings for the 14th annual Staple The Independent Media Expo. The event, which features more than 200 artists and creators, takes place Saturday and Sunday at the Millennium Youth Entertainment Complex, 1156 Hargrave St., Austin.

Founder Chris Nicholas, better known to longtime expo regulars as “Uncle Staple,” said in a phone interview that the Pflugerville Library kids zone, open noon-4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday in the East Room, features a variety of activities for attendees of all ages, including a 3-D printer, a photo booth and programmable robots.

“They have all this cool stuff at their library, and they’re pretty much bringing all of it out,” Nicholas said. “We’re going to have an entire room set aside for those guys.”

Also new to the expo is the MACC’s Caminos program, which is a paid teen leadership program under the direction of coordinator Frederico Geib. The program, which was launched in 2017, features students between the ages of 16-18 who hail from East Austin, North Austin and Manor to name a few, he said in a phone interview.

Caminos students are interested in pursuing a creative career and are willing to become ambassadors of Latino art, Geib said. For Staple, each student has created an individual 24-page zine, or do-it-yourself publication, to showcase at the expo via the program’s artist table, he said.

“So there is a wide range of styles and a wide range of narratives that each of the students did,” Geib said. “When people arrive at our table, they will get a sense of what is happening in the minds of Latinx teens around town.

“There’s a story about the Montopolis neighborhood and some things that happen in that part of town,” he said. “There are other stories that tell a smaller or intimate narrative of how immigration is working in our community. So we get to hear the voice of teens who are not usually heard often in comic form.”

This year’s expo features guest artists Colleen Coover, Jen Wang, Vanesa R. Del Ray, Ngozi Ukazu, Lilah Sturges, Paul Benjamin and Mark Kistler, according to the Staple website. Among the numerous panels offered are “Paying Your Bills with Comics,” which starts at noon Saturday and features Ukazu, and the LGBTQIA Comics Panel featuring Sturges along with Jeremy Holt, Alex Grandstaff and Dylan Edwards. The panel is moderated by Austin Chronicle columnist Sarah Marloff, according to the website.

Nicholas said the LGBTQIA panel is also a new offering this year.

“It seems like a lively group, so I think it’ll be a lively panel,” he said. “All of the programming looks really interesting this year, so I’m hoping it will all be well-attended.“

Longtime exhibitor Jamie Kaye said in a phone interview that she has participated in Staple since 2011 and noted the expo has consistently evolved over the years to become more inclusive.

“There was a year where me and many of my friends were kind of frustrated with Texas events and conventions for comic creators and artists. There would be a list of 40 guests, and all 40 would be men,” Kaye said. “And we were talking about this and how this was such a problem, and Uncle Staple reached out to us and chatted with us about this and wanted to make his event different from that.”

Kaye also said while the Austin comic artist scene is thriving, the expo represents an opportunity to reconnect with other artists across the state.

“Every year Staple is a celebration for us; it’s almost like a family reunion. Our friends from Houston and Dallas all come out to Staple, and we get very excited for it every year,” she said. “The Austin community is great, but we also love our Texas community as a whole.”