Hi! I have been wanting to get this idea started by engaging someone from a repair shop such as “UbreakIfix” to come and teach youth how to repair their iphone and/or smartphone screens. The purpose is three-fold: 1) Dismantle the “genius paradigm” that makes us all believe we lay people cannot change our own screens, 2) get kids interested in repair, 3) maybe get a couple of them to be interested in volunteering as “screen-fixers”
Does anyone have experience with this? Is there any other way of getting the same results? How do you go about spare parts? Any tips on engaging kids to want to volunteer?
Thank you!
Bea
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Great idea @Bea_Echeverria because working on mobiles usually requires professionals! 
Most professionals have their own trusted suppliers of spare parts, so that problem would be solved for you. The business we are friendly with will come to events and sell parts with only a slight mark-up and not charge for the service. We find that some businesses are super motivated to get out into the community and give back.
You can also work through school IT professionals. Check out what this school in New York has been able to achieve, when its IT staff decided to create a student-powered Restart Center
As for involving young people, we find that it’s important to get kids used to the careful disassembly required, learning about lithium batteries 
and ribbon cables on phones that feel “safe” and not expensive or intimidating. Some models of phones, like the old Google Nexus, are cheap, widely available and good for this practice.
We require kids who want to volunteer to be accompanied by their guardians, which is really a barrier to some getting more involved. We’re thinking of creating youth-only events, where our volunteers are all background-checked.
Lastly, you might also like to use our new educational resources on the materials inside our mobiles:
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Janet, this is so interesting and inspiring! I wish I could do this as a full-time job and get communities to really understand the importance of repair with regards to so many aspects of society! I truly believe this has the power to change communities.
If you ever need a bilingual (Spanish/English) person on your team, either in a remote position or in the US, please let me know!
On the meantime, I posted the video you linked in our FB page, and requested repair volunteers among the high school’s Youth Technology Corps, money for spare parts (maybe we get a parent donor, like in the video), and students with broken screens 
, which of course will be the easiest part by far!
I also plan to take a more detailed look at the Materials Matter Cards.
Again, thanks
Bea
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