Computers for community

Students at central Taranaki’s Eltham Primary School have a suite of 27 near-new laptops, donated by us.

Following a business-wide technology upgrade, we no longer had use for the laptops.

“This donation has enabled us to have one-to-one devices in our two senior classes,” says Sonia Vind, Eltham Primary School Deputy Principal.

“We also have the capacity to provide a laptop to students who require extension or support with their literacy needs.

“Our school is in a low socio-economic area and we appreciate the support to provide a more equitable education for our students.”

Before the donation, the school, which has 146 students, had only 12 Chromebooks and a few old laptops that students had to share.

“Our school motto is ‘Learn by doing, knowledge is power’, and access to the digital environment is a huge part of equipping our students for success as future learners. Generous donations such as this provided by Powerco, enables us to provide digital literacy skills for our learners,” Sonia Vind says.

“We are better able to support our students to understand and use technology. With the provision of the laptops, we can teach our children to find, use and create information online in a useful and beneficial way. 

“We now have access to programmes such as Minecraft for education, coding programmes and reading programmes.” 

Powerco’s Information Services Team cleaned and prepared the laptops, ready for the children to use.

“Powerco regularly updates its computers,” Powerco Chief Information Officer Brigitte Colombo says.

“As a company, we believe in supporting and giving back to our communities and this is one way we can do that. It’s also a sustainable way of extending the life of the laptops.”