Jeff Friedman, a local student, won a $1000 Redwood Technology Consortium scholarship to College of The Redwoods with this essay.

I have been working with technology since I was four years old. I feel that technology doesn?t just improve my life, but our communities and the world. I have been working within the EAST Project (Environmental and Spatial Technology) for two years now. This class is proof that technology improves our community. Within EAST, students use computers and technology of the highest grade to help improve the community.

Projects that have stood out within EAST that have helped the community are as follows ?

CARE (Conservable and Renewable Energy) is a project that has been in EAST since it started at Arcata High School. Raising over $100,000 in grants and scholarships, the project has installed an entire solar panel array on top of Arcata High (AHS). These panels save AHS 30% of their electricity bill. This project?s next goals are to find ways to bring down more energy costs by finding more efficient ways for energy.

SSS (Super Stream Savers) is a project that is currently trying to restore Jolly Giant Creek. This project is a continuation of a project that helped saved the Arcata Salt Marshes. To make these projects possible GIS (Geographic Information Systems), GPS (Geographic Positioning Systems), and the computer program called ArcView is used.

These are just a few examples of what technology has done to help out our community. Other examples are the electric parking ticket car that drives around Arcata, our use of Green Energy, (Bio-Diesel, Solar Energy) and HSU?s CCAT house. The CCAT house (Campus Center for Appropriate Technology) is to demonstrate the use of Appropriate Technology and to show that people don't need to use as much energy as they do. This is an excellent example of how technology can improve our community. If people start following examples of the CCAT house they could save on their energy bills and reap in the benefits.

Without technology our community would not be what it is today. These examples are just a small sprout in an expansive forest. For the best examples, go examine the annual Technology Expos?. Every year the best and the brightest get together to show off and teach others about technology. From the EAST project to solar panels this community is riddled with examples of how technology improves our life.