Old computer screens find home at school

Psalms Bedggood (front), Kaydin Palmer, Phelyxz Harding-Martin and Sanjez Tua-Taiapo about to log on. Photo / John Stone

A multinational company has managed to find a use for its excess computer screens by gifting them to a Northland school.

Last week, the team from PricewaterhouseCoopers' New Zealand division delivered 117 computer screens to Hora Hora Primary School that otherwise would have been disposed of.

It was the first time the company has partnered with a school to find a home for excess technology, but it probably won't be the last.

Principal Pat Newman said it was a "win-win" situation for the company and the school.

While many of the computer screens will stay at the school, others will be gifted to other Northland schools and community groups.

"I'll put it out to the other schools that we've got them and we can distribute them out of here," Mr Newman said.

PricewaterhouseCoopers IT head Joanne Holley said the surplus computer screens were the result of a recent technology upgrade.

While the screens, which still have three or four years of life left in them, were not able to be used at a corporate level they were perfect for schools, she said.

Ms Holley estimated prior this donation, the company had a couple hundred computers decommissioned a year. Giving them to schools made more business sense too as it cost more to have them decommissioned than it did to have them freighted.

"Generally, a lot of stuff becomes waste," she said. However, it was not a case of just dumping the screens with schools, it was about giving low decile schools such as Hora Hora technology they did not have to pay for.

"The best thing about it is that in a community like Whangarei is that even if schools don't need them families can use them," she said.

PricewaterhouseCoopers general manager of people and culture Tracey Ellis said after hearing about the idea from Ms Holley she took the idea to the company's foundation.

"A lot of the trustees said 'what a great idea'," Ms Ellis said. "This is the stuff we can help with."

The company is now looking at how it can roll out similar programmes.