E2D was founded out of two simple questions that an enlightened 12-year-old girl asked her parents back in October 2012:

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How can all kids in our school do their homework and projects successfully if some of their families are too poor to own digital technology?

What are we going to do about it?

This young girl, Franny Millen, decided that the digital divide between those who have computers at home and those who do not was an unacceptable social inequity…and one that must be resolved.

Her two questions have led to hundreds of discussions led by thousands of community activists – municipal leaders, college students, corporate and foundation supporters and civic volunteers – that has resulted in a digital revolution that will not be declared victorious until every family has access to computers and the internet in their homes.

Since 2013, E2D has worked with 167 schools in the Charlotte Mecklenburg School (CMS) system. As of Fall 2021, more than 27,000 families have bridged the digital divide using laptops provided by E2D.

Students who were spiraling downward as just “the next generation of multi-generational poverty” have begun to use their new computers to vault quickly upward where the larger student body is thriving.