Acworth high school students get free computers

From now on, when 16-year-old Corinthia Beavers needs a computer to help with homework, she won’t have to wait in line at the local public library. A shiny desktop computer, complete with a printer and Internet access, sits in the living room of the home she shares with her mom and three siblings.

“I don’t need anything else for Christmas,” said Beavers, who attends Hillgrove High.

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Hillgrove High student Corinthia Beavers and mom Carol check out the new computer.

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Beavers is one of 11 high school students in the Acworth area with a free, new computer, thanks to a partnership between the Marietta Housing Authority and the Cobb school system. Students living in housing authority developments received the computers to boost their learning possibilities.

“It is crucial in these times that our students have ready access to technology that gives them the same learning advantages as … other students,” said Fran Sutton, MHA vice chair.

The housing authority is in the process of merging its operations with the Acworth Housing Authority, which has 110 units at five properties. The computer program began two years ago in the Marietta school district, but expanded for the first time this year to include Acworth. Sutton and other community leaders presented the computers Tuesday night.

Having access to technology, including the Internet, is crucial for students and parents, said Angela Williams, an assistant principal at North Cobb High School.

“Students can use the computers for their assignments and parents can monitor students’ grades online,” Williams said.

Students who got the free computers can use them throughout high school, but in order to keep them beyond that, students must graduate, said Ray Buday, executive director of the MHA. Buday said the Dell computers are funded through the authority’s capital improvements budget.

For Beavers, having a computer will make it easier to write poems and songs, one of her hobbies. She said she’d like to become a lawyer one day, but her mom, Carol, has other plans for her oldest.

“She’s going to medical school,” Carol Beavers said.

With her new computer, Corinthia Beavers’ possibilities are endless.