We Have a Coffee Machine: The Bean Hive has arrived at McDougall!

The Bean Hive has arrived at McDougall. So what is the Bean Hive? 

it is both a coffee vending machine and a teaching tool. I invested in buying several coffee machines because I am a support worker for people with developmental disabilities and I needed something meaningful for us to work on together.

When I got these machines I always had my eye on McDougall as a location for one of them and so I approached our staff and our Operations Committee and came to an agreement to set up the machine. So a big thank you to those fine folks for all the work they do and for agreeing to it. I will be around a bunch to discuss the technical details or reimburse people if something goes wrong (please be patient) but there are three big things to know. 

First off this is an old school machines, so all you fancy high tech people using your phones to buy everything... That's not gonna work, it takes coins or tokens and I am working on setting up a formal system to sell the tokens, so more on that later. 

Second, put the cup in the machine, before buying the coffee. Otherwise my waste bucket gets your French Vanilla. 

And third this business is a tribute to Ann Gardner, she was the Queen Bee of the EE Class that she ran here and that's why I named it the Bean Hive. Ann was always encouraging me to start a program of my own and she even told me a few times how she would love to set up a cafe run by people with disabilities, and if EE Class had gotten another year, she had plans to brighten up out underused Cozy Corner... So putting this machine in that spot means so much and I hope you really do enjoy it. 

You can find the coffee maker by the Reconciliation Mural in the Cozy Corner. This is by the Southwest doors.

Patrick Meenagh