Teachers across the country came to Hamilton County on Monday for a new twist when it comes to learning. "What students do in a fab lab is look at a problem and figure a solution to it," said Public Education Foundation President Dr. Dan Challener. "Our students have more opportunities to do that than in any school district in the world." PEF Chattanooga, Volkswagen, and Hamilton County schools are putting educators from around the world to the test this week when it comes to fabrication labs, better known as fab labs. "I think it prepares them for good problem-solving," said Buckhard Ulrich with Volkswagen Chattanooga. "They learn about new technology, of course, but it's more about problem-solving, the strategy."

The Public Education Foundation (PEF) announced that the first seven Hamilton County Schools (HCS) to receive a new eLab are all elementary schools. According to the Fab Foundation from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, HCS already boasts the largest concentration of Fab Labs in the world. The anonymous $1 million donation announced last month furthers PEF’s partnership with HCS to expand student access to innovative learning and workforce development opportunities with 15 additional labs set to open over the next three years. The competitive proposal process recently culminated with the selection of the first cohort of schools that will be opening labs in August 2021.

Hamilton County Schools is expanding the number of eLabs in the district through an anonymous $1 million donation given to its partnering organization, the Public Education Foundation. Fifteen eLabs will open over the next three years, with seven opening in August. All seven eLabs opening this year will be at elementary schools — Battle Academy, Brown Academy, East Ridge Elementary, Lookout Valley Elementary, Red Bank Elementary, Soddy Elementary and Thrasher Elementary.

An anonymous $1 million donation is helping expand Hamilton County Schools’ eLab program. The school district and the Public Education Foundation announced the investment this week. PEF Director of Innovative Learning Michael Stone says education in the 21st century, is more than history and English. "No longer are they just learning math in a vacuum, or English and reading off by itself,” he said. HCS’s digital fabrication labs prep students with skills in tech, science and innovation. Now, through the new donation, HCS and PEF are opening 15 new eLabs throughout the district.

The Public Education Foundation, in partnership with Hamilton County Schools, announced a $1 million investment from an anonymous donor to open 15 new eLabs in HCS and to support the further development of the world-leading eLab network. Officials said, "HCS eLabs provide students with rich learning opportunities in engineering, computing and environmental technology through hands-on activities with digital fabrication equipment (including 3D printing, micro-computing and robotics). Now, more than ever, students need opportunities to develop knowledge and skills in science, technology, and innovation. The HCS eLabs provide a state-of-the-art learning environment where students can hone those skills as they develop resiliency and confidence solving real-world problems."

Hamilton County Schools and the Public Education Foundation have teamed up to open 15 new eLabs, or Fablabs, to the school system- thanks to an $1 million investment from an anonymous donor. These new labs will be added gradually over the next three years. “Thanks to the investment of this partnership, thousands of Hamilton County students will now have the opportunity to learn how to solve today’s problems with the tools of tomorrows,” says Dan Challener, President of PEF.

Hamilton County Schools says production is winding down in the makeshift face shield lab at STEM School Chattanooga where teachers and volunteers have spent the past month using 3D printers to make the protective equipment for local healthcare workers. Spokesman Tim Hensley says the efforts have delivered 2,756 face shields to healthcare workers, and volunteers have boxed an additional 4,163 for delivery. The team made a total of 6,919 face shields and several hundred ear-savers over the past month of production. The 3-D printers from across the districts were brought together at STEM School on the campus of Chattanooga State to have a 3-D printer farm working to produce protective devices for local doctors and nurses. The farm included 73 printers from school VW eLabs, STEM labs, Fab labs, and makerspaces in Hamilton County Schools.

Inside the STEM School, Hamilton County's science-focused high school nestled on Chattanooga State Community College's campus, dozens of 3-D printers, gathered from across the school district and the community, are churning. Like previous wartime efforts — victory gardens, women-led factories and scrap metal collections — the printers are manufacturing a public service. This time though, they are printing personal protective equipment to help local medical professionals fight the new coronavirus sweeping the nation. The effort, led by Michael Stone of the Public Education Foundation (PEF) of Chattanooga and dozens of educators who work in the district's 16 Volkswagen eLabs, is a grassroots one that has developed since health care workers and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention first started predicting an impending medical equipment shortage earlier this month.

Tyris Nelson, a recent graduate of Chattanooga School for the Arts and Sciences, laughed as he helped Julia Phillips, a STEM teacher at Soddy Elementary, sand part of a wooden project in the school's Volkswagen eLab, a science workshop, Wednesday. A few minutes later, Taylor Bowles and Laila Hinton, both rising juniors at the school, showed their former world geography teacher April Wyatt how to use the sander. She was working on a Disney-themed wooden lamp, complete with Mickey Mouse ears. They jumped back and laughed as the machine started whirring. When asked how they were helping her, Wyatt said, "These are my students. They're the ones who know what they are doing." More than two dozen teachers could be found hunched over different stations in the eLab this week. In fact, dozens of teachers from Hamilton County and 10 other states could actually be found working alongside local educators, teachers and Public Education Foundation staff at several of the district's 16 VW eLabs this week as part of the second annual Chattanooga FAB Institute.

Makers and community representatives from across the nation convened in Chattanooga Friday for the first day of NOMCON, the Nation of Makers Conference, to discuss the growing makers movement. The Washington, D.C.-based Nation of Makers focuses on promoting impactful creators by “encouraging connections, sharing resources, facilitating funding opportunities and advocating for the maker movement.” The “maker culture” is focused on empowering people to be self-reliant in their creative endeavors through the use of technologies like 3D printers, which allow them to take charge of making an object from its initial design to its completed form. In the second year of its conference, Nation of Makers has partnered with Mayor Andy Berke, who prides Chattanooga on being a “City of Creators.”