McDowell County, West Virginia—Cummings Aerospace has expanded its growing 3D Design & Printing STEM program to McDowell County Schools in West Virginia, furthering a company priority to expand the number of American kids who are exposed to STEM topics.

Ms. Christy Hunt, a teacher in the district, implemented the program using the 3D Design & Printing curriculum that was designed by the Cummings Aerospace leadership team, along with two Flashforge 3D printers donated by the company. “It’s not very often that we get opportunities such as this in our area and I’m hoping that it’ll broaden the horizons and they can see there’s things they can do here. They can even do this virtually. They can do this at home; they can design at home. Maybe it will open opportunities for them in the future,” said Hunt to a reporter.

Cummings Aerospace representatives paid a visit to a school in Welch, WV in late October, to share their experiences and to guide students through a hands-on lesson in 3D design and printing. Their visit earned attention from local news outlets—both WVVA Channel 17 (the local NBC affiliate station) and The Welch News (an area newspaper) reported on Cummings Aerospace’s facilitation of the program.

McDowell County Schools serves just over 2,700 K–12 students in ten schools. A significant portion of the district’s students are minorities. Also, well over half of the county’s families are economically disadvantaged. Cummings Aerospace is committed to bringing STEM education into areas of the country where that privilege hasn’t been available historically.