Crowther Memorial receives tool donation

Adelle Ellis
Times Reporter

 

One of Crowther Memorial Junior High School’s (CMJHS) most popular option programs, the Career Technology Foundation (CTF) wood shop class, received a generous donation of tools from the Strathmore Walmart.
The wood shop class teaches approximately 60 Grade 8-9 students each day. With that many students working in the shop creating projects, some smaller tools can quickly become worn and sometimes damaged.
The donation of the tools, including hammers, wrench sets, power saws, drill bits and tool boxes, ensures students have tools essential to creating their projects and offers them the opportunity to work with some new tools
“We’re so appreciative of the donation. It came out of the blue at one of those perfect times,” said Colin Lenox, associate principal at CMJHS. “When you get a donation like this it’s a relief and it’s nice to know that you have some corporate entities that are willing to look out for you.”
Lenox said the wood shop is an expensive program, so when they receive donations, it allows the school to be able to focus on other things such as updating machines. In addition, getting extra tools makes the process faster, and receiving different tools lets the school offer a wider range of programming.
Strathmore Walmart donated approximately $3,000 worth of tools to CMJHS and Holy Cross Collegiate.
“We always try to be that good corporate citizen,” said Justin Wright, Strathmore Walmart store manager. “Our Strathmore store exceeds all our fundraising and donation targets that we set. There is a need in the community and we want to make sure we can help fill the void wherever we can.”
For most students, taking junior high shop programs is the first real experience they gain working with tools and understanding what it is to be able to follow directions and to put something together. Students gain critical thinking skills from the program by learning that if they make a mistake, they must figure out a way to correct it.
“It’s one of those wonderful overlying programs that brings things in from every other program,” said Lenox. The students use mathematics in class to come up with correct dimensions for a project, and they use language arts to be able to explain designs and write things down.
“It is truly a cross curricular program that we can be involved with, so it’s an extremely important program and it’s a program that the kids are having a great deal of fun with,” said Lenox. “They learn a lot, it’s hands-on, they get to do a lot of experiential learning and they are walking out of the shop with some cool high quality projects.”