Whiting School Gets Makerspace Grant

MANCHESTER, NJ -- Whiting Elementary School has received a Makerspace thanks to a $350 mini-grant from the Manchester Township Educational Foundation.

Donald Webster, Jr. made a donation to fund the grant after reading about a similar grant made to Ridgeway School. Makerspaces are creative, do-it-yourself spaces where people can gather to create, invent and learn, often with a focus on STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art and Math).

Webster, whose children attended Whiting School and whose wife is a teacher there, presented the materials to Principal Evelyn Swift and a small group of students. They had the opportunity to try out some of the Makerspace materials, which included Lego building bricks, Lego Contraptions and Chain Reactions kits, a Qubits building kit, a Wheels & Axles engineering kit, a Makey Makey electronics kit, and a Design Studio game.

The students were very excited about the donation and couldn’t wait to start using it in their classrooms.

"Thank you so much to the MTEF and the Webster family for helping us to create our own Makerspace here at Whiting School," Swift said.

Manchester Township Educational Foundation is a nonprofit organization that supports the students of Manchester Township Public Schools with classroom grants, scholarships and more. They are now looking for a donor to fund a similar Makerspace at Manchester Township Elementary School. To learn more, visit www.mtef4kids.org<http://www.mtef4kids.org> or email info@mtef4kids.org.

(PHOTO: Donald Webster, Jr. presents Makerspace equipment to Whiting School Principal Evelyn Swift and students.)