The Southeast Texas nonprofit, Reglue, needs a total of 86 USB wireless adapters and speaker sets to complete a project to bring computers and Internet connectivity to 125 families with school aged children.
Reglue, a nonprofit that supplies free refurbished computers to financially strapped families with school children in Southeast Texas, has announced that it needs donations of USB wireless adapters and speakers. The devices are needed for a project that will bring computers and Internet connectivity to all families with school aged children living in housing controlled by the Taylor [Texas] Housing Authority. The authority and Reglue have already reached an agreement with Time Warner to supply housing units with wireless connections, and the adapters are needed so that Reglue’s “kids” can take advantage of those connections.
In a March 14 post on the Reglue website, Ken Starks, the organization’s founder (full disclosure: Starks is also a writer at FOSS Force), explained that the shortfall is a result of the success of the program. “At first, we were informed that we could plan on doing about 40 [installations] in a year’s time…[but] we’re now looking at in the neighborhood of 125 machines.”
“[W]e have the machines. We’ve stockpiled about 170 for the 2016 year,” Starks added. “We also have enough flat panel monitors, mice and keyboards. We have all of that. What we don’t have are speakers and wireless USB receivers.”
Since then, Starks tells FOSS Force that the organization has received enough donated adapters and speakers to keep them going, but a total of 86 are still needed.
The wireless adapters Reglue uses for their installations is the Edimax EW-7811Un 150Mbps 11n Wi-Fi USB Adapter which can currently be found on Amazon marked down to $9.99 each. For speakers, Starks suggests either the MANHATTAN 2600 Series USB Speaker System which can also be found on Amazon marked down to $8.75 (at press time there are only 14 of these left in stock) or a speaker set that is available on eBay for $9.59.
Contributors can either donate funds through the Reglue website or by PayPal to ken@reglue.org, or purchase the needed items and ship them directly to Ken Starks; C/O Reglue; 319 Sloan #110B; Taylor, Tx 76574.
