The following blog post was written by a summer volunteer that learned, through her volunteer work  with Kramden, that her family was awarded a Kramden computer. Read her story below:

My name is Bethany Wheeler and I am an eighteen year old upcoming sophomore education major at Campbell University. I currently live and grew up in Durham, NC, with my mother and two sisters; Andrea Wheeler, a Junior at North Carolina Central University and Casey Wheeler, a Sophomore at C.E. Jordan High School. A few years ago my family went through some hard times and due to our situation we had to move out of our home and into an apartment. At our new residence we did not know anyone around us and resources were scarce. During our move my eleven year old sister, Casey Wheeler, attended Githens Middle school, where she was and over achiever to say the least. Unfortunately, without a computer in our home a lot of things remained undone and in her case undiscovered.

One day Casey came home from school proudly waving a piece of paper from her teacher in her had. The document was a letter informing my mom of a program giving deserving honor-roll students computers. Within a week, at a give-a-way event, we were blessed and given a computer for our home.

The computer we received that night carried my older sister, Andrea, and I through High School helping us prepare for college and allowed my younger sister to grow into the honor student she remains today. Without the help of the organization who supplied us with our computer, our family would have been faced with even more struggles then already presented to us.

I was recently given the task to complete volunteer hours. Not sure of a local organization needing help I decided to search the web. After searching the internet for a while I came across Kramdens website. Unaware of what of what type of services I would be doing, and unsure of what cause I would be helping, I figured I would at least try it out.

I spent most of the first few days at Kramden exploring what it was that the organization did, who they were and how many people they truly help.  After volunteering with Kramden for a few days, as I was filing papers, I noticed one of the recipient receipts was labeled at the top: “recipient: Casey Wheeler“. Reading further I discovered that it was in fact the receipt that was filled out when our family received our computer, and that the organization I was volunteering at was the same on that provided me with the resources to find them; the computer. Seeing that paper brought back many memories and made me realize that Kramden Institute does more than just aid students with computers, Kramden Institute helps children and young adults build their future by connecting them to the world they live in through technology.

This summer I was able to attend and volunteer at many different events, including the Lenovo geek- a- ton, Wednesday work nights, and the Ft. Bragg give- a- way. I was nervous that I was not going to know what to do or be any help at all, but each event was an opportunity for me to give back and show everyone how amazing this organization really is. The people I met and the relationships I made volunteering were almost as great as the actual work being done. I enjoyed my time with all the volunteers and admire all the hard work and dedication they put into their work. Without the help my family received from Kramden, I would not be where I am today.