The long-awaited opening of the Bolles Maker Space will come next semester. Belmont Hill embarked on the transformation of the Bolles House, which had previously served as the main office, into a maker space at the end of last school year in its vision to grow its STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) program. The space was initially planned to open before the start of this school year, but the prolonged opening will certainly be worth the wait. Throughout its construction, the Director of the Maker Space, Mr. Ziff, has “really enjoyed seeing how it has all come together over the last few months.” Excited about the opportunities that the space will provide, Mr. Ziff hopes that all students will come by and see it.
Open to all students and all other members of the Belmont Hill community next semester, the Maker Space will provide many new opportunities. Immediately, Mr. Ziff and his Form III Introduction to Engineering class will take classes in the space; other classes may move into the space later. The plan for the space is to serve as a space accessible to all students during their free time. Mr. Ziff hopes that “this will encourage everyone to drop in when they have an idea or come in to see what is going on.” He is also envisioning an “idea board” where students can openly share and collaborate on projects by writing and posting their ideas onto a notecard. In addition to this new system, Mr. Ziff hopes to bolster the Robotics teams by utilizing the foldable robotics platform (images of the maker space building and the robotics platform can be seen on the school website). Lastly, to further Belmont Hill’s engineering program, Mr. Ziff is planning a new school-wide competition called the Belmont Hill Maker Prize, which will be detailed later.
The Maker Space presents a very exciting addition to Belmont Hill’s growing campus. Belmont Hill has much to be grateful for these new resources and opportunities. When asked about what he was most excited about the opening of the Bolles Maker Space, Mr. Ziff replied, “I’m very excited for students to have another opportunity on campus to express their creativity.”
