After-school program scores computers from Mavericks

Posted: 1/20/06

After-school program scores
computers from Mavericks

By Felicia Fuller

Buckner Benevolences

DALLAS–At the Vickery Family Wellness Center in northeast Dallas, Buckner after-school participants began the new year with the staccato clicking of new computers–11 of them.

The hardware, software and computer lab furnishings are courtesy of a $25,000 grant from the Dallas Mavericks Foundation to Buckner Children and Family Services to promote literacy and learning.

“Because it impacts the educational and vocational future of our residents, this computer lab is truly a gift that keeps on giving,” said Maria Pacheco, Buckner site coordinator. “We are so very grateful for the Mavericks' generosity and for their support of our efforts to serve underserved communities like Vickery.”

Delinquency, unemployment and substance abuse abound at the Melody Place and Melody Village apartments, where Buckner administers social programs from the Vickery Family Wellness Center.

Outreach efforts include job and life skills training, adult literacy classes and an after-school program that provides homework assistance and English-as-a-Second Language courses to more than 60 youth ages 5 to 17 from the surrounding community.

With the addition of the computer lab, “now our children have new high-tech study tools and our adults can do online job searches and learn new software programs to better themselves and their families,” Pacheco said.

Buckner was among six area organizations awarded grants through the Dallas Mavericks Foundation annual giving campaign, said Mavericks community relations representative Matt Miller.

“The Dallas Mavericks Foundation supports programs and organizations in the Metroplex that address the community's most pressing problems involving youth, specifically education, health and fitness, and community service,” Miller said. “Every year, the Mavericks Foundation gives five grants at $25,000 each. This year, we were able to include the reading and learning center project, which ordinarily is not through the Mavericks Foundation. That allowed us to award a sixth grant” to Buckner.

The Mavericks Foundation called on corporate sponsors and volunteers to furnish, paint and supply the lab, recruiting systems administrator Wesley Slaughter to help install the network. Slaughter and his business partner devoted more than 100 hours to laying the cables, setting up the hardware, configuring the server, testing the system and training Buckner staff in use and maintenance.

“We looked at it from two specific points–what is going to support the children and adults' ability to better themselves,” Slaughter said.

“The network is going to support a multimedia environment and provide the ability to run applications that will make learning fun and give users the technical knowledge to be able to thrive.”