The Arkansas Regional Innovation Hub and its new executive director, Chris Jones, Ph.D., were profiled Wednesday by PBS’ “NewsHour” show.
Winrock International, which owns the Hub, hired Jones to lead the nonprofit in March.
Jones told PBS Correspondent Jeffrey Brown, “We’re really about providing the tools necessary to create the innovators, the makers, the tinkerers, the thinkers and the entreprenuers of the future, particularily in the state of Arkansas.”
The feature introduces viewers to a new tool, a mobile makerspace called “The STEAM Roller” that is designed to reach students in schools too far from the Hub’s headquarters in North Little Rock to journey there for field trips. STEAM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts and Math.
Jones also spoke about how the Hub seeks to remove barriers for low-income people, women and people of color who aren’t typically seen as up-and-coming innovators, inventors and entreprenuers. Jones also said the Hub is helping to ensure bright futures for students statewide by exposing them to “making.”
PBS interviewed Little Rock-grown icon, Raye J. Montague, as well. She created the first computer-generated rough draft of a U.S. Naval ship and was the Navy’s first woman program manager of ships, despite being denied a formal engineering education due to her race and gender.
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