910th donates computers to Brookfield schools

By William k. Alcorn

To replace the school district’s computers with new equipment would have cost about $40,000.

BROOKFIELD — Township schools received some 50 used government computers from the 910th Airlift Wing that will be used to replace older computers in the district.

The four-year-old computers were obtained by the school district free of charge through the Department of Defense Computers for Learning Program, said Eric Lytle, technology coordinator for the school district.

“All we had to do was pick them up,” said Lytle, noting that was done on Tuesday.

To replace 50 school computers with new equipment would have cost the district about $40,000, he said.

Lytle said he began Tuesday installing school software programs into the computers, which had been wiped clean of government programs.

Lytle, who came to Brookfield schools at the beginning of the 2008-09 school year, said he was made aware of the DOD program by schools Superintendent Stephen Stohla.

The DOD CFL, managed by the Defense Re-Utilization and Marketing Service in Battle Creek, Mich., authorizes the transfer of information technology assets to historically black colleges and universities, tribal colleges and universities, and pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade public and private schools as well as educational nonprofit organizations, according to the General Services Administration Web site.

alcorn@vindy.com