Where we are now
Firstly, a huge thank you for all your amazing support. I am sorry it has taken me some time to update you on this project. We have been putting things in place to widen our support. I am pleased to let you know that we raised £2000 in financial donations for this project. Some donations were sent to us offline. We also received some in-kind support from mobile phone companies that supplied us with extra support ringing the total raised to £10,000.
This allowed us to get 40 dongles and 40 data sims to students in Barnet. We also supplied 10 refugee students with 24GBs of prepaid data. But we want to do so much more. This is just part of the story.
We are continuing to support young people in Barnet. We are launching a drive to collect your old laptops and tablets, which we will refurbish into Chrome Books and Microsoft Windows and distribute through schools to disadvantaged students.
We will continue to fundraise and use these funds to purchase new devices, dongles, and WIFI access.
Full information is available on our website, https://communitybarnet.org.uk/digital-poverty-barnet
Again, thank you so much for your support.
CommUNITY Barnet Team
This is where we started
COVID-19 has turned life upside down and inside out for everyone, including over 50 school children who have no access to the internet. For most, this might not be a problem, but the tap of learning has been turned off for these children. They have also lost contact with their friends, and their social isolation is just getting harder.
Some of our children are from families who are struggling on low incomes. Some are still new to this country and are learning English for the first time and falling further behind, simply because they cannot access education.
Lockdown has prevented them from accessing the internet through school and the local libraries. As some children are heading back to school, most are not; this is why we need your help.
"I work across five schools, and some of the families are in such great need." A Family Support Worker, Barnet Schools.
"Our children feel cut off and lost; they are worried they will never catch up on work they have missed. It causes a lot of stress for our family." A Barnet Parent
With your help, we can switch their education back on by providing Pay-As-You-Go dongles to 50 children that we have been contacted about.
With your help, we can reconnect them with their friends and help to end the exclusion and isolation they're feeling.
With your help, we can change this.
Thank you from all the team at CommUNITY Barnet