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Benjamin Herold of Education Week has put together a real cracker of a series on the challenges of ensuring school broadband access in rural communities – and how E-rate (pre- and post-modernization) is helping to address the situation.
The report notes, however, that inequitable access to broadband in rural communities creates challenges for digital literacy in preparation for work and life, and improvement in rural STEM education and workforce development requires reliable access to broadband.
This report provides evidence-based strategies and actionable policy recommendations to help education leaders and state and federal policymakers close the digital divide and build sustainable systems that ensure all students thrive beyond K-12 education.”
An estimated 23% of households that make up the broadband affordability gap are MDU residents. Recognizing this critical gap, Chicago’s Digital Equity Council prioritized connecting MDUs in its latest Neighborhood Broadband Request for Proposals (RFP). This partnership began with our response to an RFI issued in 2022.
State leadership can have a powerful impact on broadband best practices in K-12 schools–and a new report highlights success stories and strong policies supporting broadband connectivity. ” Key elements in broadband best practices. ” Key elements in broadband best practices.
Over the years, the program has been modernized to focus support on bringing high-speed broadband to and within schools and libraries. Funds For Learning is committed to supporting this expansion and will continue to advocate for policies that enhance the effectiveness of the E-rate program.”
That divide affected a significant share of college students in West Virginia, a state where officials say nearly 40 percent of rural residents don’t have broadband. After all, remote learning that relies on video calls and emails doesn’t work well for students who don’t have internet access. she asked. “If
In the months that followed, many states and school districts mobilized, using federal CARES Act funding, broadband discounts and partnerships with private companies to connect their students and enable online learning. Policy should enable bulk purchasing with transparent, affordable pricing and digital inclusion support,” the authors argue.
Even after service providers launched discounts for broadband services during the pandemic — often targeting online learning — Black Americans across the South saw little change in their access to broadband services. But nowhere is the digital divide larger than in the Black rural South. Add the bill’s $14.25 Add the bill’s $14.25
But Bredder can’t give students the tool he considers most indispensable to 21st-century learning — broadband internet beyond school walls. They’re building their own countywide broadband network. This is an equity issue,” said Bredder. “If The hardware on the towers then blasts that connection about 10 miles into the valley below.
Since before the pandemic, Benjamin Skinner has been researching broadband access and how lack of home internet impacts students’ ability to do online work. Last summer, Skinner and his colleagues at University of Florida, professor Hazel Levy and doctoral candidate Taylor Burtch, began researching broadband history and differences in access.
Broadband — high-speed internet — is critical for learning. And the pandemic focused attention on inequitable access to broadband services in education. In 2020, by one federal estimate, 18 percent of people living on tribal lands were unable to access broadband (outside of tribal areas, that number was closer to 4 percent).
To evolve our education system and improve student outcomes for good, we need to reevaluate our policy-making decisions from the last 50-plus years—not just the last 18 months—while also looking forward to what students need to learn to be successful in the future. Why on Earth should we go back to pre-COVID education policies and systems?
We are thankful for those who broadcast the news and the broadband providers that have opened their networks, lifted data caps and fees, and promised not to discontinue service. Broadband providers are facing unprecedented pressure to deliver reliable connectivity as more of our economy shifts online. These are positive things.
We have seen elsewhere in the development of revolutionary technologies that administrators, government, NGOs and policy-makers lag behind the avant-garde of tech development and adoption; (reference cell phones, e-commerce, self-driving cars, the sharing economy, crypto currencies etc.) Income vs. Access: The Digital Divide in the US.
Many states are taking innovative steps to address this challenge, implementing targeted funding initiatives to bring affordable broadband to low-income communities. million in broadband infrastructure, funded by the Treasurys Capital Projects Fund, prioritizing low-income and multi-family housing. Connecticut Investing $40.8
Advocating for changes that would uproot the foundation of long-standing institutions, policies and practices can quickly begin to feel like an uphill battle, no matter how many educators are working for the cause. students still lack the broadband capability necessary for digital learning.
million students who lack internet access, the nonprofit is also looking ahead to the future, when 1 Mbps per student becomes the new broadband benchmark. students with access to at least 100 kbps of broadband has increased from 4 million to 44.7 Last year, when 94 percent of districts had access to high-speed broadband and 6.5
We also know that schools that can afford these types of initiatives, and which have the policy frameworks and supporting networks in place to enable seamless tech integration are few and far between. Change is happening at a far slower rate across “ordinary” schools. Focus on the positive, work with what you have and get creative.
Gamino, New York City’s Chief Technology Officer, in an interview with EdSurge earlier this month, noting his office’s desire to close the “homework gap” caused by lack of broadband connection in homes. And about 62 percent said they were not aware of tools created to help them manage their internet use and request bandwidth upgrades.
There are some attempts to plug the cavernous hole that would leave in funding broadband advances. I feel like we’re all running this marathon,” says An-Me Chung, the director of teaching, learning and tech at New America and strategic advisor to the organization’s education policy program.
And, that makes access to adequate and reliable broadband even more important as the development of new technologies continues. Marc Johnson, Executive Director of East Central Minnesota Educational Cable Cooperative (ECMECC), then provided perspective from a regional and local level on the expanding use of broadband. About the Host.
Equity in access, from broadband to devices is a concern and something that districts need to work to meet head on. “ Commit to Student Privacy and Clearly Articulate Policies to Stakeholders. With the new year now upon us, listed below are six edtech resolutions for 2016. Commit to Ensuring Equity in Access and Opportunity.
In Albemarle County, Virginia, where school officials estimate up to 20 percent of students lack home broadband, radio towers rise above an apple orchard on Carters Mountain, outside Charlottesville. Reg Leichty, legal and policy consultant for CoSN (the Consortium for School Networking). Photo: Chris Berdik.
Three years later, our work has made broadband affordability a national priority, catalyzing bipartisan action at federal, state, and local levels. This included establishing the nation’s first-ever federal broadband benefit – the $14.2 billion of Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) funds.
In a July 2017 statement , FCC Chairman Ajit Pai designated August as Rural Broadband Month at the agency. typically don’t have ready access to museums or science centers, and if their school can’t get reliable, affordable broadband, it’s unlikely that its students will have access to good Internet. at home either.
Apartment Wi-Fi Residential Retrofit About: Piloted in Greater Boston in 2023 and expanded statewide with a grant from the Massachusetts Broadband Institutes (MBI) Digital Equity Partnerships program. Department of Treasury Capital Projects Fund (CPF) grant.
In the quest for universal broadband service, state broadband offices have a critical role to play, especially in administering funds through the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program. Established by the Infrastructure, Investment, and Jobs Act (IIJA), the $42.5 BEAD NOFO, Section I.B.1)
Tailwinds: An Enabling Ecosystem A baseline enabling condition for game-based learning is access to computers and broadband. COVID has also accelerated funding for broadband in underserved neighborhoods. Proponents of game-based learning have good reason to be optimistic—but also cautious.
Most of these households, he said, “have infrastructure available at their home but they just can’t afford to sign up for a broadband service.” Only a third of those without broadband access blame a lack of infrastructure; the remaining two thirds without access say they can’t afford it, Marwell said.
Broadband : 85% of respondents took steps last year to improve home broadband and device access for students, with 71% continuing prior efforts and 14% launching new efforts during the 2023-24 school year. 92% of respondents in 2024 reported increased interest compared to 54% in 2023.
This month, Maine became one of the first states to share their draft Broadband Action Plans and companion Digital Equity Plan as part of the $42.45 The state plan pays particular attention to tackling the broadband affordability gap , which makes up two-thirds of America’s digital divide. Maine State Broadband Action Plan, Section 2.2
million broadband connections, according to the FCC. Our ability to keep our kids connected with home broadband access, I believe, is one of the most significant issues that we’re grappling with right now.”. They argue funding for high-speed internet and connected devices needs to be a permanent part of federal policy.
Broadband affordability is the number one barrier to universal connectivity and has become a national priority. Flume Internets will cover over 14,000 households for as low as $10 per month, meeting the FCC definition of broadband at 100/20 Mbps. million American households.
This diversity is driven by: advancements in online learning system design, rapid roll-out of broadband world-wide, the changing dynamics of the labor market and. A 2012 Economic Policy Institute report revealed that only 40% of US “software engineering, programmer, or computer scientist” jobs were filled by computer science graduates.
The post Congress Debates New Stimulus, With Money for Education – and Potentially Broadband – In Mind appeared first on Market Brief. Congressional lawmakers this week started working on the next coronavirus stimulus package, which will have major funding implications for K-12 education.
Broadband penetration in K-12 schools reached over 98 percent , while low-cost computing devices like Chromebooks have proliferated in classrooms. They may also find themselves at the mercy of sudden changes in national policies, such as the restrictions recently imposed in China on foreign investment in K-12 programs.
According to the latest survey data from the Pew Research Center, 73 percent of adults have broadband internet at home. While 92 percent of adults from households earning $75,000 or more per year say they have broadband internet at home, just 56 percent of adults from households earning below $30,000 say the same.
One of the largest concerns, though, is equity — not just how we must fund solutions to address disparities in student access to digital devices and broadband Internet, but how students safely engage to drive learning. This was a critical first step. But access alone wasn’t enough.
If the workday of an adult typically requires seamless broadband access, then it’s reasonable that today’s students need the same access during their school day. The key is the state leadership to make broadband accessible to all. More important, states are starting to recognize the need for equitable access off site.
Hillary Clinton may not be in office, but she has enough policy plans on her website for four full years. Her boldest claim: That her administration would close the digital divide by 2020 with 100 percent of American families having the "option" of quality broadband.
trillion infrastructure bill into law, our nation is poised to make historic investments in its highways, public transit, railways, airports, ports, water systems, broadband networks and electric grid. With President Biden’s signature turning the $1.2 A key reason?
Instead, it will be absorbed into SIIA’s existing public policy division, which advocates for legislation on behalf of its members. Broadband internet access and cloud computing made it easier to distribute educational software once sold on floppy disks and CD-ROMs. As part of the change, the Washington, D.C.-based
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