30.04.2020- 30 days of free laptops: A review

Hardly a day has passed since 1 April without a laptop being distributed by "Wir lernen weiter". We look back at the first operational month of our solidarity project and share our experiences, moments and also venture a look into the future.

All beginnings are difficult

With the delivery of the first laptop on 14 April, the baptism of fire was done. The processes of donation, aid application and also the preparation of the equipment were tested for their effectiveness for the first time. We quickly realised that the basic considerations were correct: Supply and demand could be kept in line very well in the past weeks. What surprised us ourselves, however, was that in this short time we had 56 laptops already received, prepared and distributed have. These have mostly been made available to individual families who have not had any IT equipment to implement distance learning in their own homes. 

The very first laptop was distributed in the Muri AG area. A family with two school-age children has so far only used the mother's smartphone to download and edit files from the relevant learning platforms. We agreed: We couldn't find a better first place to donate. For a few weeks now, this device has been providing enormous assistance to the family and relieving the parents, as the children can use the device autonomously and the mother's mobile phone does not have to be misappropriated. The resulting benefit also enables the children to learn how to work with a computer. And this is exactly what we hope for from our project. 

Some letters from grateful families

Gratitude can also be a reward

The sympathy of the people, the kind words/letters and also the relieved faces were something that motivates us daily to continue with what we have now been investing daily for a short time exactly for this purpose. Tobias Schär has long lost count of the hours he invests in preparation, acquisition of new partners and media creation. Everything seems to be going perfectly. But why is the need so great when on the part of many schools the situation seems to be under control? We have now been able to find the answer ourselves: In some communities, there is a lack of accessible support services that can quickly and easily provide professional assistance to affected families.

"Wir lernen weiter" offers another anonymous way to get the equipment you need quickly. We are committed to ensuring that the education of our youngest children does not suffer due to shame, lack of contact points or monetary reasons. We advocate that digital education can basically take place in every household - even beyond school education. We believe that digital education is not achieved if it takes place on mobile phones. Document processing, communication and collaborative learning is massively facilitated when a real computer is available. And this is exactly what we want to make possible; so that Switzerland can also make digitalisation possible for those on lower incomes.

- Your "Wir lernen weiter" Team

Tobias Schär