I know things are challenging and scary these days, but the work goes on as best we can. I’m not quitting or getting discouraged, quite the opposite. W are all needed more than ever.

I’m hoping for support to purchase four 10-inch Android computer tablets for the new Media Center in the new Mansion Activities Room. Each one costs $104 plus a $39 guarantee and tech support for each.

Paryese has some beautiful and fresh ideas going into that room, and I’d love to support them. We’ve already purchased all the art supplies and puzzles they need, but the tablets are what will give individual residents stimulation, freedom, and a connection to the outside world.

The social workers and psychologists in student homes for the aging all say the occupants need a chance to do things for themselves, not just in groups, but something stimulating and connective – art, games, e-mail, Zoom. Too often, they feel disengaged and cut off from their world.  Working in groups can get sluggish and unfocused.

These tablets can go a long way towards easing those problems.

I’ve been shopping all over the place, and the best deal I found – a very good one – is the 10-inch Android machine that cost $104 each plus a $39 four-year guarantee with tech support. I think I can pull this off for just about $500, a small act of great kindness.

Paryese told me four tablets would fit the long desk of her new media center perfectly. This is one of the most exciting projects I’ve worked on since joining the Mansion. I so love the idea of fusing technology with community.

(You can support this project via Paypal, [email protected], or Venmo, Jon-Katz@Jon-Katz-13. Also by check, Jon Katz, Mansion Fund, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816. Any overage will do directly into the Mansion Fund for future use. We could use it.)

 

 

Coming strong out of the pandemic, the Mansion has taken apart its essential and much-loved Activities Room – where Maria and I teach all of our classes – and is putting it back together in new and innovative ways.

I got a tour yesterday. I was shocked at how much Paryese has already done.

Paryese is the new and dynamic Mansion Activities Director. She’s impressive and comes with all kinds of experience and great ideas for engaging the residents, offering lots of activities and giving them the chance to work alone and individually if they wish.

Many do.

She decided the room needed a re-do, and she set about re-doing it.

Paryese has been painting and drywalling the new walls herself. She has a lot of exciting ideas for transforming the room into a gathering place, an educational space, with a radically different media center.

She’s great to work with, and I’m excited she’s there.

She is passionately committed to the welfare of the residents. She’s the one who inspired me to get those raised garden beds.

Paryese wants the residents to learn and use tablets and computers to make art, communicate with the outside world, play games if they wish, and Zoom with their families.

Very little promotes higher morale for people in these facilities than a way to look at their children and grandchildren when they talk with them. It’s what they most miss.

Many of them also love games, and they will have a bunch of those.

They also have spaces for puzzling and artwork.

The tablets would be installed in the activities room and be available all day and into the early evening.

 

 

The activities room has many new intelligent puzzles designed for the elderly and those with memory problems. Many of those games are things we bought for them over the last year or two but which were sidelined during the pandemic.

They are coming out for us now.

Paryese is doing the muscle work herself; they are close to putting the room back together again. The maintenance crew is helping out. I would very much like to help if it is possible. It’s a perfect project for the Army Of Good.

If you can support this effort, please do so via Paypal, [email protected], or Venmo, Jon-Katz@Jon-Katz-13. You can also help via check, Jon Katz, Mansion Fund, P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816. Small contributions are welcome, and so are larger ones.

Paryese hopes to finish the Activities Room in a week; I’d like to present these tablets at the opening ceremony.

Thanks for considering this. Thanks for existing.

This is an excellent price for these tablets, the best I found after searching a dozen outlets online. They will make a difference and help engage the residents, stimulate them, offer them independence, and help them connect with other families and friends in the outside world.

Thanks for thinking about it.