CompuMentor News

CompuMentor Increases National Scope;
Plans Nonprofit Technology Portal

San Francisco, California, September 27, 1999

CompuMentor announced today the receipt of a major grant from the Surdna Foundation in New York which will enable the organization to create a national "nonprofit technology portal."

The $150,000 grant will cover two phases of development lasting 15 months. The key benefits of this portal for the nonprofit sector will be:

Access via eCommerce to donated and discounted software.
One-stop shopping for information about low cost hardware, both new and recycled.
Access to an aggregated array of "humanware" options for technical planning, training and support.
Links to technical assistance providers nationally, searchable geographically and functionally.
Community-building features, such as user groups, facilitating communication within the nonprofit IT community.
Comprehensive information resources on the site itself and via links to other sites.

CompuMentor is uniquely qualified to create a nonprofit technology portal, based on 12 years of technology assistance achievement and on the development of a current web site that is the leading technology assistance resource nationally. CompuMentor, founded in 1987, is the largest provider of technology assistance to nonprofits in the United States, with an FY99-00 annual budget of $1.8 million. Its competencies are mentor matching, software distribution, circuit riding, community technology center support, Y2K support, staff consulting and information dissemination via its web site and other vehicles.

The Surdna grant, in combination with a series of other recent grants - $100,000 in general support from the Hearst Foundation, a major investment in CompuMentor's Y2K program from the New York Community Trust, and a previous planning grant from the Surdna Foundation-will enable CompuMentor to build out its comprehensive suite of technology assistance resources on a national scale.

This project will be led by Mark Liu, Ph.D. (Computer Science, U.C. Berkeley), CompuMentor's Program Director and a 20-year technology industry veteran.

More information about CompuMentor is available on their web site at www.compumentor.org or by calling 415-512-7784.

For more information about the Surdna Foundation, visit www.surdna.org.

For more information about the Hearst Foundation, visit www.hearst.org.

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The CompuMentor® Project, a 501(c)(3) charitable organization
CompuMentor 487 Third Street San Francisco, CA 94107 415-512-7784
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rev 27/3/00