Level Up Laptop Appeal

23/03/2026

Our Level Up Gaming Cafe is back, and this time we're supporting Horley Community Arts Festival!

Saturday 18th April, 10am-12:30pm and 1:30pm-4pm.

The sessions are for everyone but especially young people and activities will include video games, 3D design and printing and making music.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/level-up-gaming-cafe-horley-tickets-676300301407

For more information on Horley Community Arts Festival: https://www.horleysurrey-tc.gov.uk/news/article/1545

Level Up Gaming Cafe is a fun and educational STEAM event at the Horley Health Hub.

09/10/2025

Very pleased to provide laptops to young families being helped by the amazing YMCA East Surrey

We are almost out of stock and are in desperate need of donations. If your company has spare laptops which you no longer need, please get in touch

www.leveluplaptops.org.uk

11/09/2025

What could have done this???

09/09/2025

Most of the laptops donated to Level Up Laptop Appeal have some dust in them but this one was quite something!

This was a powerful Dell workstation laptop but it couldn't breathe so was slow and crashed a lot. A clean and reinstall and it's now flying along, ready to be donated to a disadvantaged young person for their study, and the occasional game of minesweeper

02/06/2025

10 more Dell and HP laptops delivered today to Oakwood School, Horley

30/05/2025

A quick update from me.

I set up Level Up Laptop Appeal 5 years ago to solve a problem during the pandemic, and I never expected the project to keep going this long. Education has changed hugely the last 5 years and now our young people are expected to study at home on computers with keyboards, but so many don't have access to a suitable device which instantly puts them at a disadvantage which they will never catch up from.

The appeal has been going strong the last 12 months. Thanks to some amazing corporate doners I've worked through ~280 laptops and donated them to East Surrey's young people via some amazing charities and organisations like Love Reigate and Banstead, Surrey County Council, Oakwood School, Langshott School, Lucy Rayner Foundation, Action for Carers, Stripey Stork, Refugees Welcome Crawley, ESDAS, Henry Smith Charity Horley and many more.

Where I find myself now is I'm out of stock, out of funds and out of energy, but for a short while I'm good with that. I'm going to spend the summer clearing out the spares I don't need and recharging my batteries a little, with the plan of kick starting again when term starts in September.

So, sorry if you don't hear news from me for a little while. Level Up is still going, just having a rest. Have a wonderful summer 💖

Martin
[email protected]

25/03/2025

A huge thanks to Jaime Thurston and the team at 52 Lives for the incredible donation of 20 HP laptops - these were presented to Oakwood School Horley for onward donation to their disadvantaged students who are struggling with home studies.

Thanks again 52 Lives

19/03/2025

It's been interesting reading, watching and hearing the output from the BBC marking 5 years since the pandemic. An excellent special program by More or Less titled 'How did lockdown impact children' included stats from a study called COSMO (both linked below) which included some very relevant stats for Level Up:

"Barriers to remote learning – such as lack of access to a suitable device for learning or sharing a device, lack of a quiet space in the home, lack of support from teachers or parents – were all more likely to be experienced by young people from lower socio-economic backgrounds, and those who experienced those barriers reported working fewer hours during lockdowns. Those without a device worked on average 8 hours per week in lockdown 1, those with just a mobile phone 10 hours, and those with a laptop or tablet 14 hours."

"While many pupils without suitable devices received support through school and government distribution programmes, over half (53%) of those who lacked a device at the beginning of the pandemic had still not received one by the end of the second period of school closures."

https://cosmostudy.uk/publications/lockdown-learning #

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m00291y1

Our study found substantial gaps between the state and private sector in intensity of remote learning during the first lockdown in 2020.

21/02/2025

Very pleased to deliver 14 laptops to Surrey County Council for onward donation to disadvantaged young people via the social care and family worker teams

I'm very nearly out of stock now. If you like what we do here, and you work for a business that uses laptops, please convince your IT department to donate to Level Up Laptop Appeal

05/02/2025

I was really pleased to help some of the disadvantaged students of Oxted School with 15 laptops this week A huge thanks to Ellie and the fantastic Thrive team for the amazing job they do.

Martin

24/01/2025

Very happy to help the amazing team at The Lucy Rayner Foundation

Thank you so much to Martin at Level Up Laptop Appeal for supporting us. We really appreciate it!🙌

Level Up depends on community donations to provide laptops to families and schools who otherwise wouldn’t have access. If you have an unused laptop, consider donating it to Level Up. Visit their page for details❤️

22/01/2025

Another batch of laptops delivered to Oakwood School, Horley