Today, the Bishop Maginn Teachers began the Mobile Classroom Project, teaching their students who have computers from their homes. American and European museums have offered teachers a flood of excellent educational materials, from the Louvre to the Smithsonian.

I’m eager to get into Albany and see how the Mobile Classrooms work, but it might not be a good idea for right now. I will go as soon as I can. The school will be closed for at least two weeks, but almost certainly longer.

The teachers are lecturing, taking questions, giving homework.

Unfortunately, many of the school’s students don’t yet have Wi-Fi, and we are scrambling to get them the equipment they need.

Bishop Maginn is not organizing clusters of students in different homes because of health and safety issues and the uneven presence of parents and Wi-Fi.

Children, like grown-ups, need to be isolated for now. The creepy term is “Social Isolation.”

But this makes life even harder for refugee children, many of whom are still learning to speak English, and who have no experience with computing or the Internet.

I’m looking to buy 21 laptops for John Borden, the organizer of the school’s Mobile Classroom, and the students without Wi-Fi or computers. After the schools re-open some of the children without computers can keep them, and the school has urgent use for them.

Dr. Borden has been working on the Mobile Classroom for weeks. I’d like to order the laptops – I am researching the cheapest ones that work well – this week, so that they can get to the students shortly.

I think I have all but $1,000 to get all of these machines. The total will be around $4,000.

Local cable companies have offered to install free Wi-Fi for at least two months, and once I get the computers, they’ll be able to fully participate in the Mobile Classroom.

I’m expecting some contributions in the mail tomorrow or Thursday.

If you wish to contribute, you can also do so via Paypal, [email protected], or by check, Jon Katz, Mobile Classroom, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816.

The two things needed are food and computers, we are working on both.

We are also sending care packages of food to needy students and their families and are asking for help purchasing gift cards from the Price Chopper Supermarket Chain, where most of these families shop.

You can buy the cards – $25, $50, $75, $100 or more here if you can or wish to. Please have them sent to me at my home address: Jon Katz, 2502 State Route 22, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816, they can’t be shipped to post office boxes. I will get them to the teachers, who know who needs them the most.

Bishop Maginn is a lifeline for many of these refugee families, a safe and supportive haven in a challenging environment. I think the Mobile Classroom will bind them to what they know and comfort them in a difficult time.

I am figuring out how to continue this work during an unprecedented crisis.

I believe what I do now will define who I am, and who I wish to be. There are so many needy people, anyone with a heart will choose who to help. I am so lucky to have the support of the people we call the Army Of Good, and I thank all of you, again and again.