Natural lighting from floor-to-ceiling windows highlights the dozens of colorful art supplies stored on a pegboard wall. Moveable butcher-block tables and stools accommodate learners of all ages, creating from their imaginations.

As families step into the Learning Lab Wichita makerspace, they discover a flexible, ready-to-go environment filled with everything needed to bring ideas to life. The space is stocked with tools, materials and self-guided activities.

By Lauren Watkins It all started when 7-year-old Brynlee, who attends Wichita Public Schools’ Creative Minds microschool inside Learning Lab Wichita, decided she wanted to

The high school classroom, filled with sawdust and construction tools, hardly resembled a typical geometry learning environment. Students were busy making planter boxes to sell in a fundraiser to earn the supplies they needed to build a storage shed.

Creative Minds, a classroom of mixed grade levels in the Wichita Public Schools system, focuses on hands-on, exploratory learning activities for students from kindergarten to sixth grade. The curriculum allows parents to select the best educational path for their child through a personalized learning intended to ignite a passion for lifelong learning. 

Sometimes, the only way for students to figure out what excites them is to try things out firsthand. That’s why Circle High School in Towanda, Kansas, has implemented a student internship program. Circle’s College and Career Ready internship program gives students the chance to explore new career paths early by participating in job shadowing opportunities and semester-long internships. As a student at Circle, my internship started with a conversation and turned into something that has shaped how I see my future.

By Lydia Hampton, Learning Lab Wichita managing director. I was exactly who the current education system would say is an ideal high school graduate.  

The outline of a dead body is etched onto the floor in the Learning Lab Wichita STEAM Commons. Caution tape surrounds the outline, and a

By Amanda Perdaris, Senior Director of Customer Growth at Knowledge as a Service. When I first walked into Learning Lab Wichita, I felt it instantly