Make48 Awarded Grant To Expand Innovation Classroom Experience Across Kansas and Missouri

Make48+Team
2 hours ago
3 min read

Kansas City, MO (December 4, 2025) – Make48 is thrilled to announce it has been awarded a grant from the Patterson Family Foundation, a Kansas City-based organization dedicated to supporting rural communities by investing in education and local leadership.

This generous grant will allow Make48 to bring its Innovation Classroom experience to a wide network of schools across rural Kansas and Missouri over the next several years. It will ensure:

Expanded Reach: A minimum of 40 Kansas and Missouri schools each year will gain access to the Make48 Classroom Experience course.

National Competition Pathway: Sixteen (16) Kansas and Missouri schools will enter the Make48 National Tournament, providing students with a high-stakes, collaborative platform to showcase their skills on a nationally televised docuseries on This Old House Makers Channel (Roku) and YouTube.

Dedicated State Support: Make48 will engage a full-time State Ambassador whose primary role will be to support STEM in Kansas/Missouri and connect with educators, recruit new schools across rural Kansas/Missouri and build a sustainable network of resources for innovation and career exploration.

This initiative is designed to provide comprehensive, hands-on STEM education and innovation opportunities for students across the state. The curriculum, known as the Make48 Innovation Classroom Experience, was collaboratively created with The DeBruce Foundation and is deliberately infused with the Foundation’s Agilities framework. Agilities are a set of 10 distinct work-based strengths – such as Innovating, Organizing, and Working with Information – that help students recognize their natural talents and connect them to real-world career pathways.

“As an industry professional, former educator, and from firsthand experience, the support for implementing the Make48 Innovation Experience, provided by the Patterson Family Foundation, will be a welcome addition in innovative classrooms across Kansas,” Educational Experience Strategist, Sharrell Howard explained. “The wealth of real-world insight, combined with cross-curricular knowledge and practical application, encapsulated within the Innovation Experience is rare in the world of education. The result of this opportunity will be a revival of the innovative spirit in all participants and stakeholders, reigniting the pursuit of the American Dream.”

This multi-year effort will directly support Make48’s core mission of inspiring and educating the next generation of makers and entrepreneurs.

“We are grateful for Patterson's investment in rural Kansas and that their mission closely aligns with what we teach and support within Make48,” said Tom Gray (CEO). “Everyday people have innovative ideas and given the right support and confidence can go on in life and create business opportunities and economic independence for themselves and their communities.”

This Fall marked a significant expansion for the Make48 Innovation Classroom Experience which officially launched in classrooms across the country. The program is engaging young minds in hands-on learning. By connecting classrooms with leading industry partners nationwide, Make48 is effectively cultivating the next generation of innovators.

To learn more about Make48’s classroom innovation experience visit https://www.make48.com/pff

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About Make48: Make48 is a nationwide invention-competition docuseries, distributed and aired in partnership with This Old House Makers Channel (Roku), that gives teams a challenge at the start of a three-day event. With just 48 hours, teams must create a prototype, promotional video, sales sheet, and finally present their idea to a panel of judges. The teams have access to a makerspace and numerous Tool Techs (who can make almost anything), patent attorneys, marketing experts, and more. This format allows everyone to have a level playing field and the chance to win, with no prior technical knowledge necessary.

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