Refurbishing

As part of my action plan, I volunteered at Kramden in Durham, which is a local nonprofit that focuses on collecting unwanted computers and electronics from local corporations and other donors and refurbishing those machines to be given to underprivileged students in the area. In my time volunteering at Kramden, I have been astounded at the sheer quantity of electronic scrap material that is left in our area. Working to clean and test computers and monitors has led me to see that of the number of electronics we throw away thinking they are old, so many could be used by another person in our area who doesn't even have access to the same technology we render inferior. I primarily spent my time at Kramden cleaning and testing monitors, which involved using blades and Goo-gone to get unwanted stickers off and wiping down the rest of the monitor with Windex. To test the monitors, I had to first plug power into the monitor, figure out which cable would send an image to the computer(VGA vs HDMI vs DVI) and then I had to run the monitor through a series of color screens, which allowed me to see whether all of the pixels were still functioning properly and could handle all the colors. My time at Kramden has inspired me to volunteer there as much as possible, even weekly if I can manage, as I see that not only am I helping the environment by reusing electronics that otherwise degrade our environment, I'm also helping children gain access to technology that they didn't have before.