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Nonprofit Provides Access to Affordable Technology
By Deborah MacFarlane President Per Scholas Per Scholas focuses on the problem of the digital divide, and that divide is widening. As information technology plays an ever-increasing role in our economic and social lives, the prospect that many inner-city families will be left behind threatens our education and welfare. A Department of Commerce study called "Falling through the Net" reports that lower-income households are 20 times less likely to have access to the Internet. Even more troubling, 90% of all black and Hispanic families lack access to the Internet from anywhere, at any time. Since our founding five years ago, Per Scholas's mission has been to bridge this digital divide by creating Access. We do this in three ways: Access for jobs. Access for schools. And Access for families. Access for Jobs Per Scholas now employs 34 men and women in our new facility, purposely located in the heart of the South Bronx, in the poorest Congressional District in the United States. We serve to demonstrate that yes, technical jobs can exist here, and that yes, local community residents can be trained, qualified, and gainfully employed here. All our own technicians have been trained through the Per Scholas Computer Technician Program. And far beyond our own needs, we also train for jobs throughout the New York metropolitan area. Through a rigorous 12-week, 360 hour course, local community residents are prepared for jobs as computer technicians. To date, 197 men and women have graduated from the course, and of these, more than 85% started in jobs averaging $9 to $15 per hour -- a first step, and a giant step out of poverty -- with benefits and tremendous opportunities for advancement. With our expanded training facility, this year we'll enroll 160 more, 66 of whom are currently in session and will be available for positions later this Spring. Call to hire them. Access for Schools Especially for school districts with limited budgets, serving children and families of limited means, we assemble new computers and labs under the Per Scholas name, derived from Latin, meaning "for schools." And through an integrated package of hardware and support, to date we have built, installed and serviced more than 16,000 new Per Scholas computers for 1,200 schools and nonprofit organizations. Call for our product brochure. Access for Families Our new 100,000 square foot facility in the American Banknote Building serves as a full-service disposition outlet for large volumes of computers coming out of service. The process is simple. Beginning with an initial triage and removal of proprietary information, done according to Department of Defense standards, incoming equipment is separated into two streams: Recent-model equipment, which is reconditioned for families; and older equipment that has reached end of life, which is de-manufactured and recycled. Pentium-level computers are reconditioned as affordable, multi-media, Internet-ready systems. They are upgraded with a new CD ROM drive, modem, free Internet access, Windows operating system, software, monitor, new keyboard, mouse and speakers -- with a one year warranty, and toll-free help desk support -- for $250. We call this our Access line of computers, and we make them available to community-based organizations for distribution to low-income families. Our partners, who bundle our hardware with family training, include day care centers, after-school programs, senior citizen centers, job training programs, schools and public housing. Our primary partner in this effort is the National Urban League, which plans to distribute 5,000 Access computers to low-income families this year. Call if your organization would like to participate. Telephone Per Scholas at (718) 292-2300, or visit their Web site: www.perscholas.org.
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Community Resources.... Penguin Days Strengthen Technology Use (March, 2005) Collaboration and the Calculator: Increasing Food Stamp Access in NYC (December, 2003) NYC Tech Collaboration Breathes New Life into National Initiative (August, 2002) Teaming for Technology: A Connectionist Approach to Making IT Happen (November, 2001) Searching for Cancer Information on the Internet: A New Project in Harlem (April, 2001) TECH NEWS: Changing of the Guard (November, 2000) Nonprofit Provides Access to Affordable Technology (May, 2000) Lessons from the Life of a Learning and Access Center (December, 1999) Black Data Processing Associates Offers Training, Performs Community Service (October, 1999) Communities Becoming LINCT in New York City (August, 1999) New York Cares Launches Partners in Technology Program (April, 1999) Program Donates Technology to Nonprofits (April, 1999) It Takes More Than Computers. . .Libraries in the Information Age (December, 1998) BrookynX - A Guide to Getting Your Communities on the Net (October, 1998) Other Articles of Interest.... Help is Just Three Digits Away (October, 2001) Intergenerational Technology Initiative Seeks to Bridge the Digital Divide (April, 2001) TECH-U-NET: Providing Technology Guidance to Nonprofits (November, 2000) Harvard Business School Alums Provide Valuable Volunteer Consulting (May, 2000) LEGIT: Training Teens for Better Futures (March, 2000) HUD Neighborhood Network Centers Respond to Need for a Computer-Savvy America (October, 1999) Hispanic Federations CREDIT Project (December, 1998) |
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