If it’s a new school semester, then Roman Caturegli must be on the road again, giving away computers.
This time, the veteran Logistics and Management Operations team member stayed closer to home with his contribution. In October, he loaded a government van with a total of 70 computers, monitors and printers, then drove them to Inglewood in south central Los Angeles.
He was met at the Inglewood Preparatory Academy Charter School by founder and CEO Raymond D. Wilder and Operations Manager Terry Bordenave. The academy has an enrollment of 490 K-8 students, with an average of about 25 students a classroom. Its students are 92% black, 5% Hispanic and 3% multiple ethnicity or no response. According to greatschools.net, an online academic rating service, which also provided the other statistics, the charter school has 3.8 students per computer. Bordenave said there are currently three computer labs, each with 25 computers, plus four computers in each classroom. “We use them for teachers to update Web sites, for a homework hotline and for curriculum expansion,” she said. Most of the computers are older-generation, she added, “and we needed more speed.” She said the District’s donation “really helped us because this way we’ll have a better computer to point out more things than we have now—it’s a real plus for us.”
Wilder, the founder, said he much appreciated the Corps’ contribution. “We are going to put your donation on our Web site and put up pictures of the computers being used by our students.” |