Category: Giving Back

There are many ways to help your favorite charity. And now, you can do that FOR FREE. And, as a bonus, keep your underused electronics out of the waste stream.

That’s right. Avoid the landfill, help a fellow citizen, and just, well, feel good.

Trained volunteers of STUG have been recycling computers, tablets, phones and related electronics since 2004. After deleting sensitive/personal data, we install updated operating systems and programs on these devices and pass them on, free of charge, to over 40 local non-profit organizations, students, unemployed residents and seniors.

To date, more than 17,000 devices have been donated to the community, more than 600 just since the beginning of this year. All devices that cannot go to a new home are recycled, not trashed. If you have an unwanted laptop or other device, phone us at 941-539-7401 or email refurb@thestug.org for more information. Our blog and our website have more info on how to donate or to apply to receive a computer.

Your favorite charity could benefit! We have helped these local groups thrive, thanks to your donations and the volunteer refurb crew from STUG.

21st Century After School Program + 4 Hope Communities AARP + ABA Academy + Atwater Elementary School + Beyond the Spectrum +Booker Elementary School + Career Source Suncoast clients + Children First + Children’s Guardian Fund + Community Foundation + Dreamers After School + Education Foundation + Emma Booker + ESOL + Faulhaber Fab Lab + Florida Center for Children and Family Services of Venice + Foundation for Dreams + Girls Inc + Goodwill clients + Guardian Ad Litem + Harvest House + Heron Creek Elementary School + Historic Spanish Point + Indian Festival + Jefferson Center + Joseph Recovery Center + Komputer For Kids + Laurel Civic Center + Literary Council of Sarasota + Living With Dignity + Mothers Helping Mothers + Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Church + Newtown Janie Poe Housing Project + Newtown Masonic Temple + Newtown Children’s Preschool + Nur Academy + Our Mother’s House + Phillippi Shores First Grade students +Project 180 + Purpose House + Red Cross + Red Cross Ham Radio + Resurrection House + Salvation Army clients + Sarasota Housing Authority + Sarasota Native American + Sarasota Music Archive + Sarasota School Students + Sarasota Suncoast Academy + Sarasota Virtual School students + SPARCC + STC students + Students Leadership Academy in Venice + Suncoast Polytech students + Suncoast School of Innovative Studies + Suncoast Tech College students + Take Stock in Children – Manatee +Take Stock in Children – Sarasota + True Worship Outreach Ministry + Tuttle Elementary 2nd Grade students + Voice + Wee Care Christian Academy + Wilkinson Elementary School + Woodland Middle School

Things were hopping at the STUG Refurb Center.

Hard at work that day, Mike Hutchinson (below, left) and Bill Crowe (below, right) (that’s Adam in the background, working away at his station) gave a tour of the workspace. Everything from cables to caddies is neatly sorted and stored for just-in-time reuse in configuring laptops and desktops, whenever someone/ some organization in the community mentions a need for a device.

Did you know that the Refurb Project is such an acclaimed and established volunteer project, that Windows and Microsoft Office 2019 are donated by those corporations for use in the refurbished computers? See all the local charities that we have been able to help.

UPDATE: We got so excited about our guests, that we forgot the real reason for this post, which was to share with you just a single month’s impact on our community: In April the Refurbishing Project refurbished 94 computers. In addition, 5 computers were repaired. Equipment was donated this month to: Children’s Guardian Fund, Children First, Career Source Suncoast, and Literacy Council of Sarasota

Cheers to an ongoing community resource run by volunteers and fueled by your donations. Want to know more?

As a continuing part of STUG’s contribution to the community, the Refurb Group volunteers accept donated computer equipment for the purpose of refurbishing and updating the equipment. These items are donated to other non-profits and individuals in the community who otherwise would be denied the technology due to economic limitations.