If you’ve been in the library recently, you may have noticed a brand new “Spirit Box” tucked away in the quiet corner near the rear exit. After months of preparation, it is finally open for business.
The vending machine was purchased by the business department to serve the students, faculty, and parents of Moanalua. Stocked with Mene merch, school supplies, and electronic essentials, students can find their daily needs for school at the box.
The machine was fully purchased using a grant for Career and Technical Education under the Perkins Collaborative Resource Network. The grant allows CTE departments to fund projects for learning purposes.
The vision behind the vending machine was one that involved all the business students.
“We thought that each business class, like marketing, entrepreneurship, and [finance] could use the vending machine in their curriculum. Marketing students could determine how to get the word out, entrepreneurship could figure out what to put in it, and the accounting students could do the [bookkeeping] for it,” business teacher Joelle Kramer said.
This real-world experience is exactly what she hopes that students will gain from the brand-new machine.
“It’s a huge market,” she said, of the school community.
To make it more accessible to everyone in the market, the vending machine provides several different methods of payment. Students can use cash, coins, and even cards or tap to pay for things.
The machine is quite simple to use. First, tap on the screen to wake the machine up. Then, select the product you would like to purchase and pay attention to the number displayed underneath it. Input that number into the screen. The machine should then tell you the cost of the product. Use any of the payment methods listed above to pay and watch the machine spit out your product.
The machine has mesmerized students who have seen it since the beginning of the school year. Library Resource Manager Margaret Travers said that students have been asking almost daily about when it would be available to use. Well, the answer to that question has now been solved as the Spirit Box is ready for the Moanalua community to enjoy.
