The Boone County Library has received a $1,000 grant from the Rural Technology Fund to provide STEM learning opportunities for youth at the Chapin Memorial Library in Petersburg.
The Rural Technology Fund, a nonprofit dedicated to bridging the digital divide between rural and urban communities, will finance the acquisition of three Sphero BOLT robotics kits and three Samsung Galaxy tablets, providing the Chapin Memorial Library with its first robotics equipment.
“This grant opens the door to exciting new learning opportunities for the children and families we serve,” Chapin Memorial Library Branch Manager Kaitlin Barber said in a news release. “Thanks to this grant, our community won’t have to travel to experience robotics and coding; they’ll be able to learn, create and explore right here in their library.”
The robotics kits and tablets will be used in recurring STEM workshops, drop-in tech activities, summer learning programs and other interactive events. Participants will program robots, complete obstacle courses and tackle creative challenges while developing coding, problem-solving and critical-thinking abilities through beginner-friendly programming platforms.
