By Braden Murray | LTVN Reporter/Anchor
Tinker Tuesday, hosted by the Mayborn Museum Complex, invites people of all ages to unleash their inner creativity weekly from 10 a.m. to noon.
The program is free of charge for all Baylor students and museum members, who also don’t have to pay the price of admission.
Tinker Tuesday is held in the Design Den on the second level of the Mayborn and provides guests with various arts and crafts supplies to create whatever they desire.
Alan Small, STEM program director at the Mayborn, said Tinker Tuesday was his idea and has been occurring weekly for roughly two and a half years.
“We needed a program that would give people the ability to make and tinker with objects,” Small said. “Tinker Tuesday gave us a weekly regular routine opportunity to set people up with it.”
Small said something that differentiates this experience from the rest of the alternative museum activities is that fewer people attend; however, unlike other exhibits, people tend to stay longer at Tinker Tuesday. He said guests don’t usually stay very long while joining the museum for other activities.
“Sometimes those projects aren’t finished, and they may pack it up and finish it at home,” Small said. “Or they may come back the next week and work on it then, but the goal is for them to find a way to inspire or make something useful to themselves.”
Waco sophomore Mary Klausmeyer is a temporary worker for the STEM programs at the Mayborn and said she has been working during Tinker Tuesday since the summer started.
“There’s a lot of variation,” Klausmeyer said. “Numbers were a lot higher in the summer. But since the start of the school year in August, late August, it’s mainly about homeschooling groups or homeschooling families — where they’re probably like five families, but they have a lot of children.”
Klausmeyer said one of the most rewarding parts about Tinker Tuesday has been seeing the growth of the program and the word-of-mouth among local parent groups.
“I like having more regulars who come over and over and watching them develop their skills,” Klausmeyer said, “A family might show up with kids who have a certain novice level of experience with screwdrivers or hammers and nails or hot glue — and watching them grow in independence.”
