Tonya Witherspoon

Tonya is responsible for Ennovar at Wichita State University's development, working with partners to create applied learning opportunities for students, and working with faculty and staff to establish and increase industry partnerships and opportunities that support WSU's Innovation Campus. Witherspoon has a diverse background in technology and education. She managed OEM global partner technical training program at NetApp, one of Ennovar's key partners. She has also served as the Director of Virtual Services for ESSDACK, an education consortium that serves school districts in rural Kansas, and as the Director of the Media Resources Center at WSU leading teams responsible for classroom technology, event services, instructional design, and media production for WSUTV. Before that, she taught at Wichita State and implemented a grant to integrate technology into PreK-12 classrooms to improve the technological knowledge of teacher education graduates. Witherspoon co-founded the WSU Shocker Mindstorms competition, now in its 16th year serving as a model for hands-on STEM education for students, teachers, university faculty and parents. She has also written numerous books and articles and spoken internationally on the topic of STEM and hands-on experiential learning.