Computers donated to Salvation Army Primary

It’s a school that is no stranger to bad luck … but today the administration, faculty, and students of Belize City’s Salvation Army Primary were counting their blessings. News 5’s Kendra Griffith reports.

Barbara Lino, Principal, Salvation Army School
“The children from Salvation Army School are very, very poor kids and many of them will never, ever get the chance to use a computer, because their parents would not be able to afford it. And when they leave from here and go to high school, they are not ready for information technology through computers because we were not able to give that to them and therefore they have a little problem in starting.”

Kendra Griffith, Reporting
That problem is a thing of the past, because as of today the Salvation Army School has not one, but twenty computers. For Principal Barbara Lino, the donation is a long-awaited dream come true.

Barbara Lino
“This building was completed about the year 2003-2004 and since then I have been begging, asking the public, asking all over the place to give us computers for our little room that we have and we had not be fortunate enough to get it. On Monday when I was told that we were going to get these computers, I felt so relieved, so good because it is something that I wanted so long for these children.”

The equipment came courtesy of U.S. based N.G.O., Universal Peace Federation.

Ernesto Gomez, Universal Peace Federation
“We met through the principal of the school and also Major Robateau, so through him we got to know their necessities and so forth. So we saw the need and since we got this donation this shipment coming in, so we said let’s give some to the Salvation Army.”

According to U.P.F. member, Ernesto Gomez, it’s not only the Salvation Army who will be receiving the gift of technology.

Ernesto Gomez
“There’s a big Christian organisation in the U.S. that has been working with U.P.F. for quite a few years and like I said, they donate computers, not only that, they donate also medical equipment, surplus, and so forth and this time they got over two thousand computers that were donated to them, so periodically we will bring them here to this country. The next computers are coming in June, July. So we will work our way, not only in Belize City, but throughout the villages.”

And now that Lino’s finally gotten her computers, the icing on the cake would be if the school could also get …

Barbara Lino
“We need A.C. and we also need some printers. So if anybody’s out there, those are cheap, so anybody out there who wants to give us twenty printers, we’ll gladly take them. So please listen carefully, we need twenty printers and we need at least two A.C.’s for the room.”

Kendra Griffith reporting for News Five.

U.P.F. is headquartered in New York, but operates in a hundred and ninety-two countries around the world.