New Board Members & Computer Donation Program
I’m very happy to let everyone know that we have two additional board members who were voted in at our April 15, 2009 meeting. They are Gloria Dennard and Dr. Abraham E. Haspel. Gloria is the current site manager for the UMI Warner Robins office and previously worked with Northrop Grumman. She has over 20 years experience in US Air Force program management and is the 2007 American Taekwondo Association World Champion in weapons. Dr. Haspel is the president of the Cogent Analysis Group, LLC a company he founded in 2008 which provides consulting services to commercial clients and government agencies. He has a long and distinguished history working at the highest levels of the U.S. government with the Department of the Interior and the Department of Energy. We are honored to welcome Gloria and Abe to our Board of Directors.
At the April meeting the Board decided to concentrate our resources on computer donations to Native American schools in need. The objective is to provide technology to schools serving Native American children so that they can compete with the same skill set as other children at their grade level and emerge from high school prepared for the technology-based challenges in our current economy. We recently were approved as a new partner organization by the National Cristina Foundation, a not-for-profit foundation which encourages companies and individuals to donate computers and other technology, which is then matched to charities, schools and public agencies. This was the result of a grant drafted and submitted by one of our volunteers (and wife of Board member Brad Barnes), Heidi Barnes with assistance from UMI Network Administrator James Rallo.
We will be receiving computers from the Cristina Foundation periodically for the purpose of placing these computers in schools in need serving Native Americans. James Rallo has engaged the Combbat Robotics Team comprised of students from two local schools, Astronaut High School and Titusville High School. Prior to shipping the computers out to the designated Native American schools, six students from the Robotics Team, under the supervision of James who is one of the team mentors, are volunteering their time to dust, erase all data and install software in the computers. Many thanks to these students for giving of their time to help Native American students who are not so fortunate with their technology capabilities!
Kim L., our Veterinary Technology scholarship student is in the second year of the program and finishing up her spring semester. She will be taking her finals the first week in May and then have a short break before Summer school. Kim continues working for our board member Dr. Paul Burger at his animal clinic and the reports are that she is an excellent worker and an asset to the clinic!