Teaneck High Donates 3D-Printed Face Shields: Coronavirus

TEANECK, NJ — Students at Teaneck Public Schools aren't in the classroom right now, but STEM teachers in the district are making sure they continue to learn while giving back to their hard-hit community amid the new coronavirus.

Rolando Monserrat is the supervisor of STEM education for students in kindergarten through grade 12 in Teaneck. With the help of one of his students and other STEM teachers in the district, he has assembled and donated 340 plastic face shields to Holy Name Hospital.

Monserrat said the Teaneck High School already uses 3D printers in its curriculum, teaching students about digital modeling and engineering. While instruction has gone online for those students, they're still working to draft 3D designs, and STEM teachers are printing them in their homes.

"We will test them and show them and sample and do whatever for the students will then see electronically what they've done," Montserrat said. "Then, they can do other modifications or iterations to the designs."

Montserrat said he was first inspired to turn the school's instruction into a goodwill project after he saw plans for 3D-printed face shields on an open-source website for 3D printer design files.

The first model of the shields, he said, took more than three hours to print. Thanks to help from the 3D printer community, the design was refined and masks began to print in an hour.

Montserrat said Teaneck's principal loaned him three 3D printers from the school, and he got to work.

"He let me use three of his 3D printers that he has in the media center," he said. "I united them with the multiple 3D printers that I have in my home, and we were able to start producing the quicker and more efficient design that had come about."

Montserrat is producing the masks with the help of his former student, Elias Sanchez, who is attaching transparency sheets (clear plastic sheeting used in overhead projectors) to the shields' frames.

"His family is very serves in many capacities in the community," Montserrat said. "His father is an auxiliary police officer in Teaneck. I reached out to him, and he immediately latched on to the opportunity to be able to help."

Montserrat said his student used a three hole punch to make holes in the transparency sheets and attached them to 340 face shield frames. The shields were then donated to Holy Name Hospital in Teaneck.

"The reason why we reached out to Holy Name Hospital is because Teaneck is the one town in Bergen County that was hit hardest," he said. "It was basically ground zero for New Jersey."

For Montserrat, creating the face shields is about more than just helping health care workers in their time of need. It's about "the students being able to see the relevance of what they're learning in the classroom and how it can impact their lives."

"When you see something like this — the opportunity to take what you're learning in the classroom and immediately implement it in your life to serve and impact others in a positive way — that's very powerful," he said.

Rolando Monserrat, science director for Teaneck schools, has been using his personal 3D printer, and borrowing three others from the Teaneck schools, to produce face-shields alongside one of his students, Elias Sanchez. They just donated their first 340 face shields. #NJThanksYou pic.twitter.com/r4QUXaiwGJ
— Governor Phil Murphy (@GovMurphy) April 15, 2020