STEM centers allow students to explore technical subjects through hands-on experience with innovative equipment, according to an article in EdTech.
Many K–12 districts have found creative ways to incorporate STEM into their curricula, but until recently it was rare to see schools with dedicated facilities for STEM learning. That’s starting to change as more districts leverage industry partnerships.
“They’re certainly becoming more common,” says Austin Hall, director of policy at the STEM Education Coalition. “But it’s not because schools suddenly have more resources; it’s because they’re engaging with outside organizations and foundations that want to support hands-on STEM education.”
National Science Foundation data shows STEM-related professions are growing faster than the educational pipeline can keep up. Companies are investing in STEM programs to create interest in the kinds of jobs they’ll increasingly need to fill in the future.
At Hillsborough County Public Schools (HCPS) in Florida, a collaboration last winter with the Foundation for Community Driven Innovation led to the launch of the HCPS/FCDI STEM Center at Adams Middle School. The center serves as a practice and competition space for the district’s popular robotics and drone programs.
“It was born out of necessity,” explains Catherine White, HCPS supervisor for K–12 STEM. Students had previously used a site at a local mall that FCDI, a local nonprofit, had leased and made available to the community. When the organization lost access to the space in 2025, “they had to box up everything, including their robotics floor, because they didn’t have anywhere else to go,” she says.
White’s team offered FCDI the middle school’s gym (Adams had recently closed because of falling enrollment) if the organization would give the district free access to its STEM programming infrastructure. The deal was accepted, and now the center is home to several robotics “fields”— designated areas where students experiment with robots and drones they design and build themselves.
One of the largest school districts in the country, with more than 230 K–12 schools and nearly 220,000 students, HCPS has made STEM education central to the student experience for years. The HCPS/FCDI STEM Center, where students now participate in events like the annual FIRST Robotics Competition, is the district’s latest effort “to make STEM fun while also making it more accessible to more students,” she says.
Giving students easy access to a range of STEM activities is also the goal at the Pryor High School Innovation Center in Pryor, Okla. The facility is near dozens of industry employers, including the world’s second-largest Google data center.
Pryor High School students get hands-on experience in everything from virtual reality programming and computer science to aviation and aerospace engineering. About 120 high school students enroll in the center’s classes each semester. The center is funded by Pryor Public Schools and through grants it receives from industrial-park businesses and the state educational agency, Oklahoma CareerTech.
One group of students is building a “FarmBot” to automate the seeding and maintenance of a small garden. Innovation Center Director David Day explains that the students are leveraging open-source software for the project, and they’ll also be writing a business plan with the help of AI tools such as Microsoft Copilot and Google Gemini. Eventually, they’ll grow their own produce and donate it to a community organization that provides support to people in need.
“I think these kids will be prepared for whatever comes next,” Day says. “The skills they’re developing and the things that they’re learning, they’re going to be useful long after school.”
EdTech
