APCUG 2005 Jerry Award Winners

 

Jerry Schneider created the original concept for the APCUG community service awards which were sponsored by Ziff-David, Microsoft, Adobe and other vendors.  They created R.E.A.C.H. which stood for Recognizing Exceptional Achievements in Community Help.  The R.E.A.C.H. awards were given in 1992 and 1993.  Jerry was a unique individual who saw the need for APCUG and the unique role user groups played at the start of the PC industry.  As one of the founders of APCUG, the community service awards were subsequently named the Jerry Awards to honor him for  his leadership and the time and energy he gave to establishing APCUG.

We couldn’t have a Jerry Awards contest without judges. 

Thanks to the following people for judging the 2005 entries:

 

Tom Liberatore,

Sandy Frunzi,

Aaron Coldiron,

David Herschberg,

Yvette Marrin. 

 

And our corporate Jerry sponsors:

Corel,

Microsoft

CompUSA  

 

 
The Jerry Awards consists of three categories:

 

 

Ongoing:

[A program run by, or in association with the User Group. The program should have been in existence for more than one year.]

And the winners are!


 1st place ($1,500) - Central Maryland UG Columbia, MD) for the Phoenix project. Since 1991, the group has refurbished over 15,000 computers that were donated to schools in Maryland and persons in need, the Ronald McDonald House and community centers in Baltimore city and county.

2nd place ($1,000) - Sarasota PCUG (Sarasota, FL) for refurbishing computers (240 over the past 25 months) to local non-profit organizations such as Girls Inc., the Women's Resource Center, Suncoast Center for Independent Living, Coastal Behavioral Health Care, Every Child, Inc., Children's Cancer Center, and individuals who can not afford a computer.

3rd place ($500) - Central Iowa Computer User Group (Ankeny, IA) for Recycling Old Computers Kindly (R.O.C.K.) that refurbishes computers and provides then to non-profit organizations, schools, churches and government agencies.  In 2005 R.O.C.K. provided equipment for a computer lab for a rural school district hit hard by budget cutbacks due to a local factory closing; supplied several other school districts with computers to increase their computer resources without large procurement costs; provided computers to missionaries in New Guinea; shipped dozens of older computers, inconjunction with the Firestone Corporation, to Liberia.  They also provided computers to Habitat for Humanity, local drug counseling agencies, church-run day care centers, non-profit child mentoring groups, etc.  They refurbish up to 1,500 computers per year.

 

How:

[This category requires the User Group to provide documentation on how they run their program.]

 

And the winners are!


1st place ($1,500) - Cajun Clickers Computer Society (Baton Rogue, LA) for develping a database, in conjunction with the Department of Agriculture, Humane Society and ASPCA, used to reunite Katrina pets with their owners.

2nd Place ($1,000) - Tampa Bay Computer Society (Tampa Bay, Florida) via the Random Acts of Kindness program.  By partnering with local libraries, civic groups, computer user groups, and the national Random Acts of Kindness Foundation, members with the necessary expertise repair computers for those in need. PC tune-up clinics are offered to the community; approximately 80% of the people being served are seniors, many on limited income.  RAK is operated at no cost to the recipient, so donated spare parts are essential to make the event viable.  Over 250 computers have been repaired during the five years that the TBCS clinics have been conducted.  Computer systems are also built and donated to worthwhile organizations such as a local museum, a learning-disabled child, etc.

3rd place ($500) - Tulsa Computer Society (Tulsa, OK) for helping the Superior Pawnee Computer Society in Nebraska get their computer refurbishing project off the ground by developing a standard Image that can be loaded on all donated computers, thus making it easier and quicker to load software on donated computers.

 



New


[A program run by or in association with the User Group that has been in existence since December 2004.]

And the winners are!


 1st place ($1,500)  - Rockport Computer Users' Group (Rockport, Texas) entered into a partnership with the local AARP representatives and Tax-Aide to provide income tax preparation for residents of Aransas County, Texas.  The partnership involved allowing the AARP Tax-Aide group to use computers in the Rockport Computer Users' Group meeting room.  Three computers were used two days a week from 9 am until 1 pm beginning February 1, 2005 and continuing until April 15, 2005.  Tax-Aide volunteers worked a total of 21 days and eight counselors spent 430 hours assisting 435 people.

2nd place ($1,000) - Computers Assisting People (Cleveland, Ohio) has helped over 250 local non-profit organizations with over 10,000 PCS and uncounted numbers of printers and other peripherals in the last 10 years.  They have established dozens of computers labs with Internet connections in all 21 Wards of the city.  They were faced with a new situation this year.  Hundreds of prisoners were being released beack into the community due to shortages of jail space and other reasons.  Most were residents of 3 or 4 "tough" Wards.  CAP worked with local groups such as SAVE-A-VIP and Community Re-entry to provide a training and work environment where these men could come in and learn some skills without all the formalities of some of the government programs.  As a result, several have become A+ certified and one has started a computer business and has hired several other ex-prisoners to work for him.  CAP has now targeted returning soldiers from Iraq who now want more than their factory job.

3rd place ($500) - Central Maryland User Group (Columbus, MD).  Since Multiple Sclerosis medicines can cost from 10 to 15 thousand dollars a year, extras like a computer can be out of reach for many. Forty-five computers were refurbished in 2005 and donated to clients of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society so that they could go on to the Internet to correspond with family, friends, and other NMSS clients.  The CMUG has also established a training center where they will be able to train other non-profit workers in using Windows, Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook) and computer maintenance for the non-techie.  Most non-profits send workers to a $150-200 or more one-day training class.  The workshops will be provided for much less -- just the cost of printing training materials and lunch.


 

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