Company donates tech to Indian schools

Native American Systems Inc. has donated $100,000 in equipment and services to bring Internet access to American Indian schools in remote parts of the country.

With poor or nonexistent phone lines, isolated American Indian schools cannot access the Internet without satellite or wireless technology. Company president Robert Rutherford found that although 98 percent of all American households have phones, only 45 percent to 50 percent of American Indian households do, according to Marcus Servoss, NAS' spokesman.

So, as part of its Tribal Outreach Programs, NAS installed a satellite hookup, data network routers and 12 computers at Red Rock Day School on the Navajo Nation Reservation in Red Valley, Ariz.

Other routers will be distributed to some of the other 60 isolated schools in the nation, Servoss said.

NAS is a Denver-based business that provides information technology services and products to state and federal agencies and North American tribes.