a thought about NTR social media

In general about our topics, I note that the world around us is all hot to trot with "smartphone" this and "tablet" that and whatever, but NTR isn't in the thick of all that. Personally, any one of us might be all gaga about the latest tech thing, but as an organization we deal in used equipment, primarily desktop computers, so all the breathless babble is to be bypassed by us. And we're not activists about anything, either, so all the political and activist stuff all blows on by, except for whatever we each might want to do on our own personal time and dime. It's often interesting trying to figure out what in a focused NTR ongoing multilogue is relevant, and maybe surprisingly, and what's not. Me, I'm sure I miss some.

Nonprofit Technology Resources (NTR) (Facebook Group)

@PaulNTR (Chief Clerk's Twitter)

Tech Nonprofit Launches Literacy Effort

By J Paul Sank, NTR Staff Reporter
September 7, 2011

A powerful wave of initial support has buoyed a new program for children at Philadelphia computer refurbisher and recycler Nonprofit Technology Resources (NTR).

On August 19, NTR CEO Stan Pokras sent out an idea to several email discussion lists. He wrote, "NTR has over 40 people registered to work with us as interns via various welfare programs. These folks all have kids to support (or they wouldn't be in these programs). And they have very limited incomes."

Pokras then stated a new purpose: "I'd like to encourage them all to read to their children every night."

Abundant evidence buttresses this objective. Consider:

"Reading aloud to young children is so critical," says a report by early literacy nonprofit Jumpstart, referencing the Economic Policy Institute, "that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that doctors prescribe reading activities along with other advice given to parents at regular checkups."

"Research has continually shown that when adults read to children, discussing story content, asking open-ended questions about story events, explaining the meaning of words, and pointing out features of print," writes Jumpstart, citing Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, "they promote increased language development, comprehension of story content, knowledge of story structure, and a better understanding of language -- all of which lead to literacy success."

A grim, research-based prediction follows: "The absence of early literary stimulation is the harbinger of sustained educational difficulties."

The Family Literacy Foundation, too, writes in terms of the top tier of educational priority: "Studies prove that the most important thing adults can do in preparing young children for success in school and reading is to read aloud with them."

Jim Trelease, author of "The Read-Aloud Handbook", writes, "If our objective is to create life-time readers -- graduates who continue to read and educate themselves throughout life -- then the reality is we too often create school-time readers -- people who read well enough to graduate but pretty much stop on graduation day. That’s a striking system failure."

It's a failure with a rich-poor gap: "Affluent families read to their children more often, their homes have a richer print climate (books, magazines, and newspapers), and more words are heard in conversation by affluent children," writes Trelease. "Reading regularly to a child helps to close that gap and gives the at-risk child a head start".

As you can see, Pokras's statement of purpose resonates with the facts. After that statement, next he offered a concrete suggestion:

"What I'd like to do is have a free book rack where children's books, donated by our friends, can be available for the taking.

"Can you drop off or mail in one or more used children's books? We're not looking for the heirloom books that you want to save for your grand kids. Just the books that aren't going anywhere but deserve to be read again by parents and kids who may not have a fresh book to read from at bed time."

The response was almost immediate. Within a week, the shelf was full and needed management. Pokras appointed NTR chief clerk J Paul Sank, this reporter, who in his spare time seizes every possible occasion to read with children as a community volunteer with Jumpstart in Camden.

"It's still too early to know what level of demand we'll be able to generate," says Sank, now in charge of the shelf. The job is so new, it has no title.

"For all I know, the books may end up just being a new to-do for a duster," says Sank. "The necessity of generating demand, that's what may drive this tiny program to innovation."

"For now," Sank concludes, "I hope we can turn this surprising opening surge of generosity -- thank you, thank you, thank you -- into at least a little, steady trickle of books that can be amplified if and when needed."

New and gently used children's books may be dropped off at, or shipped to, Nonprofit Technology Resources, 1524 Brandywine St, Philadelphia PA 19130. Books with great read-aloud characteristics are especially desired. Gift cards or certificates for bookstores located near NTR are also welcome. Questions and other remarks about this program are eagerly accepted by Sank: paul AT ntronline DOT org.


RELEVANT LINKS:

Nonprofit Technology Resources
http://www.ntrweb.org

Jumpstart: "America's Early Literacy Gap"
http://www.jstart.org/site/DocServer/FY11_America_s_Early_Childhood_Literacy_Gap.pdf?docID=6481

Family Literacy Foundation: "Why Read Aloud With Children?"
http://www.unitedthroughreading.org/documents/whyreadaloud.pdf

Jim Trelease: "Why Read Aloud To Children?"
http://www.trelease-on-reading.com/read-aloud-brochure.pdf

Jumpstart in Camden
http://clc.camden.rutgers.edu/jumpstart.html

Phila Nonprofit Ramps Up Effort to Solve Public's Computer Problems

By J Paul Sank, NTR Staff Reporter
August 24, 2011

When Nonprofit Technology Resources says, "Bring A Computer Ask A Question", people who respond can expect one of the greatest consumer values they'll ever get: A free workshop comprising three hours of one-on-one expert attention devoted to solving their computer problems.

"We invite people in from the community to get their computer questions answered by professionals-in-training or volunteers or skilled work clients," says NTR Help-Tech program director Steven Feldman.

"At times we've charged for the workshop. Currently we're running it for free," he goes on. "The idea is, we are looking to serve folks that have a difficult time finding good tech support elsewhere that is affordable and capable.

"So clients will bring their computers in for a few hours, whether it's their desktop or their laptop," says Feldman. "They may use our mice, keyboards, monitor, and Internet connection to leave some of that stuff at home. And our techs-in-training or interns or other skilled volunteers will help them with whatever computer questions they have."

A reasonably typical example of the BACAAQ workshop happened on July 6. Let's go there now:

Senior citizen Safiyat Muhammad's laptop "takes a long time to come on. And then when I try to do anything, sometimes it'll let me get through a process like the Facebook or the Hotmail. But, say, within ten minutes of me trying to get in, it'll freeze up, and then it'll shut down. And it's driving me outta my mind. I don't know how to fix it, so I came here for help."

Cheryl West, who joined NTR's Help-Tech program four days ago, has begun assisting Muhammad by "running an error program, 'cause the system, as soon as it's booted, it let us know she has some errors in the system, so now we're running a report to see exactly what that may be, and then we'll take it from there to see what could be causing her problem.

"I do believe it's memory," she adds, "'cause she only has, like, 1.5 gigabytes in the system, and it may just need an upgrade, but we won't know for sure until we read all what's in the system."

In addition to classroom and online training, the Help-Tech program provides participants with real-world experience in computer refurbishing and troubleshooting. Participants learn valuable computer support skills such as communicating with end-users, researching and providing solutions to hardware and software problems, and documenting problems and their resolutions. If they complete the program, they go back out into the world armed with two certifications that qualify them for jobs as help-desk technicians.

Vaughn Johnson, also a student four days into the Help-Tech program, is assisting West, his wife. He agrees that the laptop "might need more memory, but we'll see."

At this point, we should note that you can never go wrong by adding RAM (Random Access Memory) to a computer, but it may or may not fix a problem with slowness. Only if the hard drive is in top shape will it make sense to find out if RAM is the choke point. RAM problems don't often change with time and use. Drive problems, on the other hand, get progressively worse even if the software on the
computer stays the same. If NTR CEO Stan Pokras were here in the room, he would recommend that a hard drive "defragment" procedure be tried.

"Right now, we're going under the safe mode," says West a little later. "Okay, and then the safe mode, at least, it'll help boot her system up a little bit faster. It *is* a little bit faster, but accessing some of the information is still coming a little slow."

"My brother brought me here about a year ago to look at computers (in NTR's Computer Thrift Store)," says Muhammad, "because my son needed one and I was told that I could get something relatively inexpensive for him, and so I came and I looked around.

"His wife wound up buying a computer for him, so I didn't come back here," she continues. "But I came here last week, because I couldn't get this to operate. I came on a Monday; they said, 'Come back on a Wednesday around 12:30, 1:00,' and that there are classes, and that possibly someone can help me with this problem and correct it. If not, maybe I could get a different computer, if this doesn't work out."

It will probably work out somehow. NTR has a great depth of expertise, so if a Help-Tech helper doesn't succeed, an NTR person with more extensive knowledge will step in.

"What happened, I was trying to do banking on here," says Muhammad, "And it shut down in the middle of the banking. So I went on the phone and did the banking. Then I had a problem, because when it shut down, it had done the banking on the computer, but it shut down in the middle, giving me an indication that it wasn't working, and when I banked on the phone, I did double payments, and then I had overdraft fees."

Being a senior with a low income, she could ill afford those fees. "I said, 'I gotta get this thing fixed.'"

About an hour into the workshop, Muhammad says, "We're being patient. Making progress, though. It's moving faster than it did when I brought it here. It's going to different locations without it taking forever."

"There was a lot of problems where she had a lot of items checked, where in startup it would open up about 22 windows," says West. "So we narrowed it down to at least sixteen of them that we know that she actually needs to use. So now that we rebooted the computer and it opened up faster than what it was doing, so we're getting somewhere."

"But I do believe she's gonna need more memory," West adds. "So we're getting ready to check and see what type of upgrade she needs to use for her system, and once we do that, we should be okay.

"If that doesn't work," she goes on, "then we're gonna uninstall some of the programs she has in here that may not be necessary for her to have, to free up some more space also."

"Two months," says Muhammad, "I threw up my hands, because I was sitting there, 45 minutes, an hour, getting nowhere. ... Hopefully this'll do it for me."

As the workshop draws to a close, Muhammad says, "I'll be back next Wednesday, because we're working in the safe mode trying to get it to operate, but it has some very intricate problems."

"Basically, we're trying to back up what's in her system," says West, "and then reboot it, reinstall everything, and start all over to give her more access to more memory in her computer."

= = =

Clarence Draper, currently between jobs, has come here for "education and information".

"My question is, 'Why isn't my printer working?'" He hooks the Hewlett-Packard scanner/copier/printer up to his Toshiba laptop, and it doesn't do anything.

Before he registered for the workshop, he had been letting the problem ride. He's "almost embarrassed to admit" how long.

Now, though, he has become "fascinated suddenly with the computer world. ... The capabilities ...

"I'm in awe, to tell you the truth," he concluded. "It's just such a fascinating tool. I think I'm in for a nice ride. I'm excited."

BACAAQ helper Dorlean Murrain-Harris, another Help-Tech student, starts by "trying to download his drivers, connect this printer so I can print." If she can find some drivers online, download them into the laptop, get them installed properly, then the little programs will make the printer work with the laptop.

Draper also has a Kodak webcam he'd like to get working.

A little later, Murrain-Harris appears to be having trouble. "So far, no good. The drivers are in, the connection -- it's still not connecting."

Draper asks whether NTR takes donations of equipment. It does. He may decide to donate this printer if it can't be made to work with his computer.

Later in the workshop, Draper reports his status as, "failure to complete".

Murrain-Harris says, "The printer needs to be re-installed. We don't have any disk to re-install, so it cannot be completed."

Finally, at workshop's end, Draper is packing up his equipment while Murrain-Harris says, "It's no use. Compatibility's a problem ... between Windows 7 and HP."

But "the camera was cool," says Draper. "There was no problem there. Got [rid of] some spyware, and I'm good to go. I shall return next week" for "more knowledge. ... [BACAAQ is] priceless, as far as I'm concerned."

= = =

Cassandra McNeil, a graduate student, has been "unable to do my homework." Her desktop computer "had a lot of pop-up viruses. I couldn't write one document because of that."

Help-Tech participant Eric Stanford started his supportive efforts by intending "to install an XP operating system on there. It's possible that her old operating system was removed -- I don't know the location -- so we're trying to give her another one." Due to severe damage from the viruses, "it's gonna take more than a scalpel to get this thing done."

Such a serious repair effort would surely cost at least $100 or more in a shop, but here at BACAAQ, McNeil won't pay a dime for the several hours of labor. She says, "I actually went to a repair shop, at a computer repair store, and got bilked out of my money, basically."

"I actually purchased my first computer from here, [through] Community College (of Philadelphia)," she adds. "Initially, when I purchased my first computer here, I had to attend a [two-hour] class on a Saturday, learned to put the memory in and -- and I thought it was very exciting, so I remembered that experience, so that's why I came back here. ... That was a very exciting experience for me, so I always remember this location."

She's had the computer for five or six years. It has long outlived the three years NTR guaranteed it for. "I bought an *extended* warranty even, and it [has] outlived *that* one."

Help-desk trainee Angel Blanco is also on the McNeil case. "We're using a system repair disk to repair from XP, and it's three different partitions on the drive." Now that he knows about the unusual structure, he's zeroing in on drive C:, hoping to repair the system files there.

An hour or so later, "we're making a lot of progress," says McNeil. "What they did was they got my operations up and running. Now there's a lot of icons on my desktop that we need to uninstall. And then we need to put an anti-virus on there."

As the workshop nears its end, Blanco says, "The browser's hijacked everywhere I go. It's taking me somewhere else, so I gotta -- I don't know the main site of the security software, so I'm having trouble installing it. Now Internet Explorer is saying it isn't installed, so I can't use Internet Explorer. So I'm kinda stuck. Hopefully this works when I restart Firefox, and hopefully I can download this anti-virus program, 'cause she really needs it."

McNeil is feeling "wonderful compared to all the problems that I did have when I came in here." The majority of her problems have been solved, "except for this one. We've cut down to this last one. ... We're at the last stage, and I'm really sure we're gonna conquer this one, also."

= = =

The Bring A Computer Ask A Question workshop has been helping people with their computer challenges for seven years. In June 2011, however, it underwent a radical shift. Feldman lists the differences:

"We've gone from running once a month on Saturdays to once a week on Wednesdays. This allows us to make this workshop a training opportunity for our Help-Tech clients.

"We've also decided to stop charging for the program. Our costs in it are fairly minimal, especially when we run it during the week. Being that it's run during the week, it's not as easy to attract folks that are working. Making the workshop free helps us bring a meaningful reason to come back again -- it's absolutely free rather than $5 or $15.

"Finally, we have a consistent helper base in this workshop now. In the past, we were relying mostly on volunteers, and now we are relying mostly on our program clients that are already here during the week, already learning about the products they're supporting, and already planning on going into the field of tech support."

The "'Bring A Computer' workshop is wonderful," says NTR chief executive Stan Pokras, "because it really gives people who can't afford to have their computer worked on otherwise an opportunity to have some expertise brought to bear on their system and their problem.

"It serves our mission really well," Pokras continues, "And it's a whole lot of fun. It's always interesting, it's always different, and the people coming to help, who are working in there on the problems that people bring to us, generally enjoy themselves immensely, so it's a good thing for everybody concerned."

Bring A Computer Ask A Question is offered every Wednesday from 1:00 to 4:00 pm at 1524 Brandywine Street, near Broad and Spring Garden. There's no charge, but advance reservations are required and can be made easily by calling 215-564-6686.

Student Volunteers Refurbish, Receive Computers

Student Volunteers Refurbish, Receive Computers

By J. Paul Sank, NTR Staff Reporter

High school student Tharon Daniels no longer has to keep asking his mother for a password when he needs to log on to a computer and get schoolwork done. Thanks to a computer given to him gratis on April 28 by Nonprofit Technology Resources (NTR), he can now log on to his own computer in his own room, get his work done, and "chill for the rest of the day."

Daniels, when not in school, is a member of a teen group called Digital Connectors (DC), a Digital Inclusion program of the People's Emergency Center (PEC) in West Philadelphia.

"We're constantly trying to narrow the digital divide through our programs for sixth-graders, teens, and adults," said PEC Digital Inclusion (DI) program manager Ron Edwards.

"We supply computers when we can get our hands on refurbished computers, and we distribute to the community," said Edwards. "So having students work here as volunteers helping NTR, and getting volunteer hours for [our] program ..., and receiving a free computer system from NTR helps us out immensely."

"Over 1100 participants have gone through our programs and more than 600 computers have been distributed," according to PEC literature. "DI provides free courses in computer and internet literacy to local residents. Upon completing the course, students receive free or low-cost computers along with technical support. Additionally, DI promotes viable, low-cost broadband internet access for the people it serves."

The DC students at NTR didn't just receive; they also gave. From March 1 to April 28, they volunteered four hours a week.

"We had them refurbishing," said NTR warehouse coordinator Melvin Bonilla on the last day of the students’ participation. "By refurbishing, they learned a couple of the troubleshooting techniques. We showed them how to take care of their own computer that they built. And now they're taking the computer home."

"We wanted them to get it the first time, so they could do it by themselves," he said. "The person that's there with them should only be answering questions, really, just in case they run into a problem."

Five out of the seven teens did get it the first time.

"The first time I needed a little help, but after that I was like, 'All right, I got this,'" said student Andrea Davis. The most fun part of her NTR time was "putting together computers, knowing that I did it myself without any help."

Volunteering at NTR felt good to Andrea. "It's, like, you did something that most people can't do." She mentioned a recent conversation in which somebody said, "I wish I knew how to do that."

"I didn't know that you had to do that much just for a computer," said student Jasmin Minor. "It's a lot that you got to do just to get your computer set up."

"The imaging process [for installing a full set of software], I think that was the hardest part," said Sharonice Daniels, "because you had to have the right image on the computer. If it's the wrong image, it's gonna work, but it's not gonna work right for that type of computer."

The most fun parts according to Minor and S. Daniels were refurbishing a lot of computers, stripping some, learning how to work the software duplicating machine, going into the BIOS (a setup feature), and finding out about the various types of RAM and hard drives.

"My favorite part was stripping the computer," said T. Daniels, "taking it apart, getting a feel on the inside of it, seeing the motherboard, stripping the hard drive, seeing the inside of a hard drive, how everything works."

"Then you start to refurbish the computer," he continued. "Once you get on there, log into Windows, start defragging the computer, seeing how a computer works like a city a little bit: Inside of a computer, you have busses, and everything works together."

The DC program engages teens in a number of activities like learning how to handle money, shooting and editing video, creating photo essays, and a project, in which, according to Davis, students go to businesses and see what each business is and what it does. Then the students write a profile of each business and post it online.

T. Daniels was evidently pleased with the program: "With the information I get from PEC, I bring it back to school, and when I go to computer class I don't have to be looking stupid like I don't know what to do. So I just get on right to work."

At NTR, these DC students got work experience, and they acquired "familiarity with computer hardware that they wouldn't otherwise have an opportunity to handle," said NTR chief executive officer Stan Pokras. "Even though they might have computers there at PEC, they wouldn't have the variety that we have."

The new partnership is good for NTR, too: "We're learning how to be a service organization that includes teenagers in our mix of service offerings," said Pokras. "The young people and staff from the People's Emergency Center have given us an opportunity to practice serving teenagers who are supervised by training staff from another agency. It’s been a learning experience for everyone."

Edwards said he looked forward to an "official working relationship," in which more DC groups would volunteer for NTR and receive computers.

Davis said she intended to give her computer to her aunt, who lost everything in a fire.

RELEVANT LINKS:

People's Emergency Center

http://www.pec-cares.org

Lancaster Avenue Community Directory

http://lancasteravephilly.com/joomla/

Hmm, story still in the pipeline. ...

After posting "To Tell the Story of NTR", I prepped like a reporter -- to the extent I could imagine how -- and attended a workshop where student-volunteers from the People's Emergency Center were receiving free computers as part of an unusual Learning Through Technology deal. Investigating by interview, I gathered a treasury of interesting and moving quotes, assembled them, and sent it to our CEO. Hopefully sometime soon I'll get approval to post a final draft here on the blog.

To Tell the Story of NTR

Hi, my name is Paul Sank, chief clerk of NTR, and I've been assigned the task of "writing the story of NTR". I'll have to spend some time getting my bearings on what that means and making plans on how to go about it, but in the meantime I happen to have a published sample of my writing I can show you. A fire story!

From the Maple Shade Progress newspaper, Friday, April 15, 2011:

As warm as Monday was, naturally we opened the windows when we got home from work. Not long after, we closed the back one. The smell of smoke had wafted in from the charred apartments across the grass alley.

I'm Paul Sank. My wife is Vicky. We're a couple of 50-something, 15-year resident Shaders. We live on Laurel Drive and behind the Clover Path building that burned Sunday.

Early that morning, around 3-ish, toward 4, Vicky woke with a start at the sound of someone yelling. She heard an older man:

“Jump! Jump! You have to jump! JUMP!”

She rose, as fast as one just woken can. Turning the bed corner, she noticed that our window, with its room-darkening drapes, was glowing.

Orange.

Fear began to come upon her. Gingerly, she touched the drapes. She didn't feel any heat, so she pushed them aside.

Without the drapes, the blinds confronted her with even more pulsating, orange light. But probing, she felt no heat, so she made an opening with her fingers.

Her eyes then rose to the top of the back roof of the Clover Path building.

She could just barely see flamelets a couple of feet or so high, darting up intermittently from the roof's far side.

She brought her eyes downward, where she saw a figure standing in the dark grass alley and looking up at the second-floor window, sixth from the left end. In the window, she could make out the figure of a 20-something year old man, silhouetted by flames and orange-lit walls.

She looked at the roof again. The flames were already reaching higher.

Dropping her gaze back down, she saw a figure rise up from the ground. He joined the older man, and the two ran away to safety.

Now knowing how serious this was, she called 911. Responders were already en route.

I had fallen asleep in the other room. She woke me and summoned me to the window. An urgent feeling began to grip me as I approached the glowing blinds. Nervously, I peered through.

Up from that building -- one exactly like the one in which we'd just been sleeping -- shot a bonfire-sized blaze licking and lapping maybe 12 feet into the sky.

Never have I felt so small before a fire.

We deliberated what to do. We got dressed as calmly and quickly as we could. We went outside, out our only door, the front, where I looked up immediately.

In the dark sky nearly vertically overhead, an orange-tinted black column billowed and roiled ever upward, flanked by a rising helix of dancing sparks.

Finally we heard sirens.

My Experience so far at NTR

This will be my first of may blog post about NTR, I just started class on Tuesday. My day started out by meeting everyone, then we went right into a basic computer skills test. I passed this test without any problems. Chuck(the instructor) set me up with the pre-tests to see exactly where my knowledge level is in relation to where it should be.

By the end of the day I was done with two out of three tests to get my IC3 Certification. The next morning I finished the only one I had trouble with Key Applications. I started on the Help Desk Certification, which will take a minimum of 12 weeks to compete. One of the most interesting things so far about this experience is working down in the discount computer store learning the business. I will have more information to come in the future but that is all for now kids.