A borrowed computer
is like a rental car--it works, but the user can never really get comfortable
with it. "You really feel like you understand something on the computer
when you're able to spend many hours [on
it]," notes Elisabeth
Stock. But "when you give computers to schools," she says, "there's
often no sense of ownership."
That's why Stock, 32, co-founded the New York City-based Computers for
Youth, a program that provides low-income families with donated computers
and Internet access. Stock who lives in Manhattan with her husband,
Ben Austin, 37, |
 |
a marketing exec, launched
the program in 1999 with lawyer Dan Dolgin. So far, CFY has given
computers to 251 families, who also receive a short lesson. The only
hitch? Getting kids to stop hogging the computers. "We say
during training, 'Have all the parents gotten to touch the keyboard and
the mouse?' All the parents will say no." |
