Elaine Dibner

About two years ago the computer repairs we were making for Kramden Institute (our home-based program to collect and distribute computers to deserving, less-advantaged school students) were consuming 80 percent of our free time and just a little less of our home. There was more demand than we could supply and time was the biggest challenge. My husband Mark knew that if we had more people doing what he and my son Ned were doing, we could help more students. From this need sprung the www.Kramden.org Web site, the application for non-profit status, and eventually, beginning in August 2005, the “Geek-A-Thons” that are now being scheduled throughout the Triangle. We’ve had them at offices, schools, and our next (our fifth event) will be held Mother’s Day weekend at InfoSystem Technology, Inc. in Morrisville.

Geek-A-Thons are a large-scale version of what started out in our basement. We still ask for donations of used computers, but we’ve just extended the request beyond individuals to businesses and universities. We still ask people for help in solving the repair questions, but they now come in person and spend the weekend with fellow “Geeks.” (They even get a “Geek” t-shirt for their efforts.) We still distribute the computer waste materials but now have a professional computer recycler help us out. We still need people like me who don’t know the technical issues (nor want to), but who clean, package, run errands, and help wherever possible.

A Geek-A-Thon takes a lot of coordination and planning. A space of about 3,000 square feet has to be identified (the last one was in the large Navy ROTC facility at Riverside High School in Durham). Troops have to be mobilized (about 100 per event) and about 200 computers to be refurbished have to be collected and transported. I have volunteered to provide the food and beverages, and be one of the general workers cleaning Fritos out of keyboards and gunk off of monitors.

People are amazing, creative, and inventive when the effort is for someone else. Who said that Americans are self centered and materialistic? This type of effort brings out the generous, kind, thoughtful, and fun-to-work-with aspects of people! I’ve met wonderful folks through Kramden and I look forward to meeting more as we continue to help those students who strive to help themselves.

How did the effort grow so large? In part it was thanks to the 350+ people (the number is growing daily) who volunteer to work with Kramden. In part it was thanks to the many groups providing multiple computers to the effort, like Alston & Bird’s 60 computers or Duke’s 75, or Constella’s 100. In part it is due to the 20 or so generous donors who have helped fund the effort. And, with Lenovo agreeing to be Kramden’s founding sponsor in September 2005, our dining room and basement is now reclaimed. Kramden now has an executive director, Dr. Robert (“Boomer”) Brown at the helm, and has just moved into its own offices at 99 Alexander Drive in RTP. The next step is to package the Geek-A-Thon process so that other communities can do it.

But for us it still is a family affair. Mark has reduced his volunteer hours from 25 per week to 10, and he and Ned have reduced their time worked at Geek-a-Thons from the whole 20+ hours to a dozen; they are still in the thick of it supporting Boomer and the legion of volunteers. And, on Mother’s Day, I did my part by serving the food to the troops (25-30 people in each shift) and cleaning monitors, feeling as appreciated on Mother’s Day as when life was simpler and we simply went out to brunch.

If this work interests you, Kramden Institute can use your help. You don’t have to be a “Geek” to participate—you can support our efforts with financial assistance, your used computers (see the Web site for the minimum requirements needed to run the software the kids need), getting your company to recycle their computers through the program, and volunteering. Many teams of volunteers are needed to help with the schools, distribution, and especially fundraising. And at the end of the year we will all have the satisfaction that over 1,000 families in the Triangle will have bridged the digital divide.