One day there was weather….

I received a request from an elementary school in the city (the Gilboa School); the school has a new principal who began work this year and she knows about the Net@ program. As a result she thought we might be able to come to school and help in operating the computers before the school has to pay a great deal of money to a computer technician for a day's work.

After a brief conversation with Shulamit, the school principal, we decided, Yonatan and I, that the 12th grade should take on the project and come to school the same week in order to repair the computers that could be repaired and give them a real and honest analysis of the computer faults.
We invited the students (28.10.2007) and to our delight they came willingly. We met at the Kol Center wearing our Net@ Beit Shean shirts and set off together to the Gilboa school as a technician team (yes, we did not forget our tool boxes….)

When we arrived at school Shulamit was waiting for us. We sat down with her and she told us how happy she was that we had come, and of course told us about the computer problems and showed us the computer room.

After two hours of group work (the entire group, Yonatan and Orna) we finished restoring the computers to running condition in the computer room. We left a note explaining the problems and attached it to all the computers we failed to repair. We wrote down what should be bought in order to fix the computers (including price quotes from the Internet).

We connected a computer to the Internet in the teachers' room - a first in the history of the Gilboa School! We provided the school with additional service: the principal asked us to connect her and her secretary's room to the Internet. We gave her brief instructions about what she needed to buy in order to build an Internet network and also gave her a detailed list of items to buy (even cables!). One of the students volunteered to come to the school and install the network (wireless router and Ethernet card) once the equipment arrived.

In two hours we upgraded the school's computer system. It is hard to express our sense of stisfaction. I wish it on everyone.

The students themselves said that they were very moved by the fact that for the first time they were giving something back to the community which had given them so much.It goes without saying that we concluded the day with a pizza and a coke (on the house!!)