ASML to Give $324,000 Grant to Ambler Farm, for Student Scholarships and Renewing Gardens and Animal Areas

With sheep, goats and gardens as a backdrop, ASML executives and Friends of Ambler Farm officials held a press conference Tuesday morning, April 23, to announce that the company is awarding a $324,000 grant to the Farm.

The funds, to be disbursed over four years, will be used to renew the Farm’s educational gardens and animal habitats and to provide student scholarships for field trips to the Farm — or as Ambler Farm Executive Director Ashley Kineon put it, “to breathe new life into our educational programs…. enriching learning experiences for generations to come.”  

ASML, a multinational semiconductor equipment manufacturer headquartered in the Netherlands, has had facilities and offices in Wilton for almost a quarter-century. Its presence in Wilton as the town’s largest business is substantial — both in property and the number of employees.

At Tuesday’s press event, Brian Olson, head of finance for ASML’s Wilton site, readily emphasized the company’s commitment to Wilton and acknowledged a concerted effort to increase its contribution to the community, especially as ASML continues to expand locally.

“We felt like a passive resident, and we were kind of hiding in the woods off Rte. 7. And in the last four or five years, [globally] we’ve doubled in size to 40,000 employees… with over 3,200 employees just here in Wilton. So this community means the world to us, and we want to be a more active member of it,” Olson said.

He added that the commitment to giving back locally includes more than contributing financially; it also means active engagement and volunteer efforts, including offering paid time for employees who participate in volunteer activities in all around Wilton.

For the Ambler Farm relationship that means ASML has committed 1,200 volunteer hours in addition to the monetary grant.

“That’s huge for us, we need to get our employees out in the community. And putting those hours into Ambler is just a huge opportunity for all of us to impact local lives,” Olson said.

Several ASML employees were at the Farm during Tuesday’s press conference and extending through the afternoon, taking part in one such volunteer effort renovating a vegetable garden. Their morning work involved filling raised garden beds with soil and readying them for planting. The garden beds were built by teen participants in Ambler Farm’s apprentice program, and planting will be done by even younger kids — deepening ASML’s contribution and connection to the Farm’s overall mission.

Directing financial support where it’s needed

Owned by the Town of Wilton since 1999, Ambler Farm is an over 200-year-old fully working farm, open to the public at no cost year-round. Friends of Ambler Farm, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, develops, operates, and manages the farm’s programs, events, agriculture, and day-to-day operations. FoAF is separate from the Town, and depends on members, donors and sponsors to fund its operations, as well as its programs, events, and agriculture. 

After consultation with Farm officials, the ASML team decided to direct the grant toward funding the repair and upgrades of Ambler Farm’s educational gardens, animal habitats, and outdoor classroom spaces. Those areas were built and maintained over the past 17 years by youths in the Farm’s educational programs, most notably the Farmer Apprentice Program.

Farm officials said that after nearly two decades of heavy usage, those spaces needed significant restoration and improvements so that Ambler Farm can continue its mission of providing the public with active-learning programs, sustainable agriculture, responsible land stewardship, and historic preservation. 

The outdoor spaces that the grant will help improve are, according to Kineon, “the epicenter” of fulfilling the Farm’s mission, and ASML’s grant is “a gift for our entire community.”

Ambler Farm Program Director Kevin Meehan oversees the part of the farm that the grant will aid the most, and he was naturally excited about the potential impact. He said he wanted to put the grant into perspective.

“Literally everything that we do and how we teach about the farm and engaging kids and adults in the community is going to happen better and longer because of this grant. This grant isn’t just impacting what we’re going to be doing this year. This grant is going to ensure that the next generation of Wilton kids is going to benefit from the farm as well,” Meehan said.

A portion of the funding will also be directed toward scholarships enabling schools from Title I communities to bring their students on field trips to the Farm.

“The idea that we’re going to be able to provide scholarships so that we can bring Norwalk students here at no charge means that we can extend the magic that we have here at the farm and what we do so successfully,” Meehan added.

ASML Wilton’s Society and Community Engagement Program Manager Brian Amero said the areas supported by the grant align with the company’s emphasis on investing in the communities where its employees live, work and play.

“We wanted to make a meaningful contribution to the town. And not only does this project speak to our focus area of green communities and attractive communities, but it also has such a meaningful impact in the lives of local students, which is all obviously quite important to us,” Amero said.

But, he added, it was also important to have a longer-lasting, broader impact to the wider community.

“It also has a ripple effect and impacts the lives of every resident here in Wilton,” Amero said. “It’s also important that we look at programs and services that are helping to preserve the natural beauty and the history of our community. We don’t want to lose that. And Ambler Farm is a great example of an organization that preserves that for generations to come.”

Town officials were also on hand to celebrate the ASML grant award, including First Selectman Toni Boucher, Board of Selectmen members Josh Cole and Kim Healy, and Town Administrator Matt Knickerbocker.

Boucher called the occasion not only an opportunity to celebrate ASML’s generosity and investment in Wilton’s future but also a “headline in Wilton’s history.” She described both the founder of ASM in Europe (an early precursor of today’s ASML) as well as the founder of Gilbert and Bennett manufacturing in Georgetown — whose daughter married into the Ambler family — as innovators who took chances that had lasting impact beyond their own lives.

“It is wonderfully fitting that their legacies should meet here today, right here on our farm at this beautiful 230 year old, beautiful property. Because the question for any enterprise, any investor, any leader is always, ‘What can we make last? What can be done today that will allow things to strive and thrive tomorrow?'” she said, adding, “We’re so grateful that ASML is betting on Wilton.”

Kineon told GOOD Morning Wilton that the grant from ASML will not be used to maintain or renovate any of the buildings on the Farm — a topic that has been much-discussed during recent FY-2025 budget deliberations. As part of the property’s deed, the Town of Wilton is responsible for maintaining and renovating the structures, and officials debated whether to introduce a referendum at this year’s Annual Town Meeting on May 7 seeking $2 million for what they said is much needed restoration of Ambler Farm’s White House and Yellow House.

Earlier this month, the Board of Selectmen decided instead to propose bonding for that project in FY-2026 as part of the town’s five-year capital improvement plan.

Editor’s note: The article has been updated to correct the spelling of Brian Olson’s name. It is Olson, not Wilson.