U.S. Department of the Interior Minerals Management Service Office of Public Affairs

SPECIAL INFORMATION

MMS Sponsors Computers for Learning

The Minerals Management Service (MMS), Gulf of Mexico Region, is continuing its support of metropolitan New Orleans schools by donating surplus computers to them through the Federal Computers for Learning Program.  Since 2000, MMS has donated more than 912 surplus computers to area schools and educational nonprofits, principally to those with the greatest needs.  Thus far in the current fiscal year, 162 surplus computers have been donated.

MMS Gulf of Mexico Regional Director Chris Oynes is an enthusiastic supporter of the program.  "This is an excellent example of how surplus equipment and recycling computers can help students gain valuable hands-on computer experience and lead to greater opportunities for them," he said.  "The criteria for selecting the schools to receive the computers are simple.  Schools with the most economically and academically needy students are put at the top of the list.  We want to help those students most at need." The majority of the computers that MMS has donated have gone to schools in the Empowerment Zones.

Schools needing computers can easily request them through the program by simply registering online at the program website www.computers.fed.gov.   Federal agencies, including MMS, then select schools and educational nonprofits on the basis of need.

The Minerals Management Service is the federal agency in the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages the nation’s oil, natural gas, and other mineral resources on the Outer Continental Shelf in Federal offshore waters.  The agency also collects, accounts for, and disburses mineral revenues from Federal and American Indian lands.  MMS disbursed more than $8 billion in FY 2003 and more than $135 billion since the agency was created in 1982.  Nearly $1 billion from those revenues go into the Land and Water Conservation Fund annually for the acquisition and development of state and Federal park and recreation lands.