September 29, 2003

Dear Diana Garcia and James Wilson,

I am pleased that I, and thus the work of our group, have been nominated for your Unsung Hero award.

I would like to take this opportunity to introduce you to Tech Corps Wisconsin, Inc. (TCW). TCW is a non-profit volunteer organization dedicated to placing computer technology into the hands of children to help prepare them for their future. TCW accomplishes this goal by receiving surplus computers from companies, refurbishing/upgrading them, and then providing the computers to organizations that support children and education.

I originally chartered TCW as the Wisconsin chapter of the national organization TECH CORPS in 1996 as a result of my identification of need, and my desire and passion for all children to have access to computers for educational purposes. I have run this group, which has grown from a few volunteers to over fifty, from no staff to six current staff members, and from a 300 sq. ft. building to over twelve thousand square feet, for seven years as a volunteer out of this same desire. We have greatly expanded our scope and coverage over these past years.

TCW works in the following four areas:

▫ Providing technology equipment, training and support to schools and community agencies.

Thousands of the refurbished computers have found new homes in schools and non-profits across the state.

▫ Providing computers, training, support and Internet access to disadvantaged families.

TCW has provided over 400 computers for Racine low income families.

▫ Training TCW volunteers in workforce development skills.

Over the last six years many of the TCW volunteers have taken the technical and life skills they have gained while volunteering at TCW and used them productively in the community.

▫ Recycling unusable computers in an environmentally friendly process.

Every computer that gets donated to TCW gets properly recycled and kept out of our landfills.

TCW recycles approximately 10.5 tons of electronic equipment every year.

The PC’s for Families program (PCFF) grew out of an idea I had to reach children outside of schools, and we formed a partnership with two local community organizations and one corporate partner to run a pilot program for 60 families and then expanded the program in a partnership with the RUSD Lighted Schoolhouse Program (LSP) to provide about 350 families with computer systems, training, support, and Internet access. While the majority of this program served African American populations, we sought to serve the entire low income population and thus reached out to the Hispanic community as well. This did require a substantial additional effort to provide translated instructional materials, as well as translators and bi-lingual instructors for the training programs. We received tremendous support from community volunteers, our partners RUSD, and Next Generation Now Daycare and an outstanding effort from our own AmeriCorps*Vista volunteer, Kristoff Ausderau. This commitment continues today with our bilingual volunteers and our two current AmeriCorps*Vista volunteers, assisting in technical support calls.

We are an all volunteer group and without the work of these volunteers we would not be able to do what we do.

These volunteers are high school students, college students, community members, and industry professionals.

It is our hope, that through the continued support of the community and our partners we can one day grow to become the kind of self-sustaining organization that can serve this community and this state for many years to come.