SENIORS GET A MISSING LINK
Brothers inspired to start Tech-Angels after helping great-grandmother communicate with family during pandemic
Living in a nursing home can be a lonely experience for some residents, especially if their loved ones live out of state. But three young brothers in Rancho Santa Fe are helping seniors get better connected with friends and family. Through their nonprofit Tech-Angels, 13-year-old twins Jaiden and Keanu Seeliger, and their younger brother Milaan, 12, collect smart devices to give to seniors living in memory care facilities and nursing homes. When the brothers bring them to the residents, they walk them through setting up the devices, adding the residents’ contacts and downloading games for them.
“We decided that if we wanted to really help other people, that we’d have to start reaching out to the community and start giving back to the elderly,” Jaiden said. “We thought it’d be a great chance for them to start being able to use technology, and it’s also a way for them to connect with younger people they might not have been talking to or seen for a while.”
The brothers have distributed nearly 60 smart devices to nursing home residents, and since they’re often shared by multiple residents, the project has reached more than 150 seniors to date, said Dimple Shah, the boys’ mother, who helps support Tech-Angels.
In addition to phones and tablets donated by people who no longer have a use for them, Tech-Angels has been awarded funding to purchase new devices for older adults.
Through a $1,500 grant from the San Marcos Community Foundation, the brothers were able to purchase 20 lightly used iPads to distribute to residents of the Country Rose Estate Memory Care and
the Village Square Healthcare Center long-term care facilities.
During their philanthropic endeavor, the boys have been supported by their parents — Shah and her husband, John Seeliger — who helped them launch the nonprofit’s website and lend a helping hand when they need it.
“I’m doing a lot of the behind-the-scenes work, so things like finding local grants for them,” Shah said. “They do a good job of filling out the initial application and doing some of the basic research, and then I’ll help supplement it.”
For the Seeliger brothers, the mission to connect older adults with technology is a personal one.
During the pandemic, their maternal great-grandmother, a 98-year-old native Gujarati speaker, was living alone in a New Jersey nursing home. It was difficult for her to communicate over the phone with the boys, who don’t speak the language native to the Indian state of Gujarat.
In looking for ways to virtually connect with her on a regular basis, the idea of getting her a smartphone that they could use to video chat with her seemed like the perfect solution.
After seeing the impact that it had on the well being of their Moti Bah, which means “great-grandmother” in Gujarati, the brothers felt moved to share technology with even more older adults in the community.
“As the pandemic has carried on and people haven’t really had the opportunity to connect to their loved ones and elderly people in their family, we were like, ‘Other people must have the same problem,’ ” Keanu said.
Although having devices to communicate with and play games on can be beneficial for the seniors’ mental health, Country Rose Estate Memory Care Administrator Val Paraiso said that’s only a small fraction of how his residents have benefited from connecting with TechAngels.
Showing the senior residents — many of whom are living with Alzheimer’s disease or dementia — how to use the devices one on one gives them an opportunity to spend time with a younger generation. Paraiso said the residents whose memory loss is not as advanced still fondly remember their visit with the Seeliger brothers.
“They’re so willing to come back to the community and check up on my residents, I think that is the extra gift that they gave,” he said.
“The funny thing is, they think that they’re giving tech as a gift, when it’s not really the tech, it’s just their attention, time and compassion.”
As they looked back on their early run of donations, Jaiden recalled one person in particular who their efforts made an impact on.
During a trip to the Grand Canyon two years ago, the boys gave a device to Arizona resident Adolfo “Harpo” Celaya, a World War II veteran. News 4 Tucson reported that Celaya, who died last December at 94, was one of only 316 survivors from the sinking of the Navy cruiser Indianapolis in 1945.
During their visit with him, they showed him how to use the phone and helped him make a call to his daughter.
“He was really happy because he was not very connected and it was a big opportunity for him,” Jaiden said.
The boys are just getting started with their philanthropic endeavor, yet they have high hopes for the future of their nonprofit.
From finding more grants to accepting donated devices, they aim to reach even more seniors in need of a communication medium.
“It just makes me feel happy to know that it’s not just us that have devices, and that others can talk to their grandmas or grandpas that they might not be able to see because of COVID or anything else going around,” Milaan said.
Anyone with a smart device to donate or who wants to sign up to receive one can find out more information by visiting techangels.org or emailing techangelsinfo@gmail.com.
“They’re so willing to come back to the community and check up on my residents, I think that is the extra gift that they gave. The funny thing is, they think that they’re giving tech as a gift, when it’s not really the tech, it’s just their attention, time and compassion.”
Val Paraiso • Country Rose Estate Memory Care administrator