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Communications Education

FCC Showers Schools Across the US With $1.2 Billion From Emergency Connectivity Fund (techcrunch.com) 37

Posted by msmash from the closer-look dept.
The FCC has sent out the first checks from its Emergency Connectivity Fund, an effort to help close the "homework gap" at schools by covering the cost of computers and internet services. From a report: Thousands of school districts, in every state plus D.C., Guam and Puerto Rico, will split this first $1.2 billion distribution, and there's still lots more to come. The problem they are looking to mitigate is the large number of students who, in an age when studying, homework and now even classes are all done online, lack a device or adequate internet connection to participate. This exacerbates an existing inequality, for these students often lack access to other resources and end up falling behind through no fault of their own. The ECF was conceived to combat this, and funded earlier this year as part of the big pandemic recovery bill. It's a $7 billion program in total, but the money is being distributed over time as schools and libraries make their formal requests, saying they need to cover the cost of this many tablets, or wireless hotspots, or broadband connections. The FCC seems to be picking up the bill as long as the request is reasonable and the paperwork is in order.
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FCC Showers Schools Across the US With $1.2 Billion From Emergency Connectivity Fund More

FCC Showers Schools Across the US With $1.2 Billion From Emergency Connectivity Fund

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  • The problem they are looking to mitigate is the large number of students who, in an age when studying, homework and now even classes are all done online, lack a device or adequate internet connection to participate.

    WebTV [wikipedia.org] and PLATO. [wikipedia.org]

  • broadband (Score:5, Interesting)

    by jriding ( 1076733 ) on Friday September 24, 2021 @02:19PM (#61829001)

    They should have used some of that money to start up municipal coops. Give some competition to the cable monopolies.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by t0qer ( 230538 )

      Wish I had mod points, this is the only thing that makes sense, unfortunately most population centers are a monopoly (comcast) or duopoly (comcast/AT&T) with little to no choices, and this is by choice.

      A few years back I looked into this, in 2012 Comcast's "Government Relations" lobbying arm spent $380K to keep their monopolies.

      • Comcast's "Government Relations" lobbying arm spent $380K to keep their monopolies.

        $380K isn't enough to hire even one lobbyist.

        I believe you dropped a few zeros somewhere.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by bjwest ( 14070 )

          Comcast's "Government Relations" lobbying arm spent $380K to keep their monopolies.

          $380K isn't enough to hire even one lobbyist.

          I believe you dropped a few zeros somewhere.

          I'm pretty sure large corporations like Comcast have their own lobbyists on staff. That $380K was the amount spent to buy our representatives, and it's a not only a shame they can be bought, but to be bought for that small of an amount shows just how fucked our Congress is.

          • Just to be clear, you are upset because Comcast spends far less than you expected on influencing Congress?

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by bjwest ( 14070 )
              I really don't know how you read that into my statement. I said the $380K was spent on lobbying, not lobbyists, and complaining about how cheaply our representatives can be bought.

      • ...this is the only thing that makes sense...

        I couldn't agree more. I hopped on board when my city started offering municipal broadband. I already enumerated all the benefits I'm getting from this, so I'll be more brief here:

        1) Symmetrical gigabit for MUCH less than the Cable company charges.
        2) No data caps, thus no overage fees.
        3) No usage restrictions, including running servers (the service encourages this).

        I can't imagine the criminal incumbent ISP's existing in my area for much longer, and I hope the door DOES hit them in the ass on their way out

      • Itâ(TM)s only $1.2B, in government hands you may be able to get 10 miles of fiber out of that.

    • But that makes Verizon's lobbyists cry!

  • That's like almost a whole penny compared to what goes to Wall Street every month.

    • Can you provide your source that the FCC gives trillions (I'm trying to do the math of 1 penny to 1 billion dollars but my ADHD medicine has worn off so I don't have the focus to do it) a month to Wall street?

      • FCC, Federal Reserve... it comes out of your pocket and creates other needless shortages. Your distractions are absurd

    • What disturbs me is that no-one seems to upset about the FCC showering schools with gold. If someone was giving my kids a golden shower I'd be pretty upset I can tell you.

  • Hard to argue this isn't a good use of federal dollars at this time and situation. Youz all can moan about shoulda couldas, but I'll encourage you to think instead about what-to-do-next.

  • Unions. Poof! money gone.
    • Um no. Public funding for schools does not go to the unions. Teachers who elect to be in one of the teacher's unions pay dues just like most other unions. The unions also do not direct how the money is spent. That is determined by the school board. You might want to investigate how the public education system works and how the funding is used before making seriously inaccurate remarks.

      • Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)

        by oldgraybeard ( 2939809 )
        "Teachers who elect to be in one" yep! unions! all about choice and free association

        • Re:Pork for the Education (Score:4, Insightful)

          by slack_justyb ( 862874 ) on Friday September 24, 2021 @06:02PM (#61829799)

          all about choice and free association

          I'm just going to say, a single employee cannot fight a funded group. The people opposite of unions are usually a group of people. So take the union away and you've got Dave versus BFE county board of education that's got ins on State coffer money to help the whole "find out" should Dave decide to "fuck around".

          That whole "free association" BS I hear just basically makes every fight a pea shooter versus an F15. I mean, I guess you got your choice, but fuck if it'll mean anything. To them, there's thousands of yous, there's only one of them to hire from the sea of yous.

  • Showers? (Score:3)

    by necro81 ( 917438 ) on Friday September 24, 2021 @03:11PM (#61829243) Journal
    I get that, in absolute terms, $1.2 billion is a lot of money. But spread out across the entire United States, it's minuscule, and hardly qualifies as "showering". It's more like "sprinkling" or, depending on how efficient the bureaucracy is, "virga [wikipedia.org]".

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by PPH ( 736903 )

      But spread out across the entire United States

      So the aim should be to allocate funds to where the need is greatest. Not sprinkling them evenly across the entire country. And definitely not into the pockets of the telecom executives.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by eepok ( 545733 )

      Yes!! Thank you!

      There are nearly 27,000 high schools 67,000 middle schools, and around 100,000 elementary schools in the US and they teach around 51 million students. $1.2B divided evenly among the schools is $6,186. Let's say we're just focusing on high schools for now-- That's less than $45,000 each.

      What would any of us do with $45k to help digital connectivity in a high school... especially as one-time funds?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Rhipf ( 525263 )

        What would any of us do with $45k to help digital connectivity in a high school... especially as one-time funds?

        I get your point but this isn't a one-time funding.

        Thousands of school districts, in every state plus D.C., Guam and Puerto Rico, will split this first $1.2 billion distribution, and there's still lots more to come.

        So this is just the first round of funding with more coming at a later date.

  • https://nypost.com/2021/09/18/... [nypost.com]
    https://wjla.com/news/local/ci... [wjla.com]

    This is not isolated.

    US public schools will continue to suck as long as student learning is not the #1 and only mission. There should be no #2

    • It is for 95% of the schools out there. However, when children come from environments that are unsafe and generate extreme amounts of stress they rarely want to participate in what schools have to offer. You can't force a child to learn. All you can do is provide the means and do your best to inspire them to do so. And schools should definitely have more than one mission. Educate, provide a safe environment, provide extra curricular activities to help social interaction and keep them interested in succeedi

  • Personal experience (Score:5, Informative)

    by Pollux ( 102520 ) <speter AT tedata DOT net DOT eg> on Friday September 24, 2021 @03:44PM (#61829371) Journal

    I just received a notice today that our district is getting around three thousand dollars to help pay for 20 hotspots. We didn't need the money, but applied for it since it was made available. (There's so much COVID Relief funding that's poured into school districts over the last year.)

    But I had a personal experience with the application that I'd like everyone to know far & wide. On the application, there's a question that explicitly asks: "With the funding you are requesting from the Emergency Connectivity Fund Program, how many students in your school or school district will you provide with a broadband connection, because they otherwise would not have had a broadband connection that was sufficient to engage in remote learning?" I put an answer of zero, and in the narrative, explained that hotspots in our portion of rural Minnesota do not provide an FCC-defined speed of 25Mbps down / 3Mbps up. The case reviewer literally changed the number to 60 without my consent, because I had notified them that we had 60 students in our district who had declared that they did not have broadband internet at home. I expressed my extreme disapproval in writing, explaining that we were only getting 20 hotspots that could not connect 60 students, and that, again, a hotspot is not the equivalent of a broadband connection in our regional area. I then received a 2nd notice, saying they were reducing the number from 60 down to 20.

    So, when you hear a politician say that this money is getting kids connected to broadband, take it with a grain of salt. All we're doing is pumping more taxpayer dollars into the hands of Big Telecom.

  • Schools are mostly re-opened now (except when there's a panic over a COVID case). Shouldn't we have been doing this 12 months ago? And hasn't the need largely passed?

  • Even if you could supply every student with an internet connected device, this still isn't enough to help those children living in poverty. You also need to train them in how to use those devices effectively for studying. Studying online takes a lot of self-discipline &/or supervision (e.g. Check out the findings from the 'One laptop per child' programmes or the many other online & distance education pilot studies in developing countries). Try working out how you're gonna provide the necessary &

  • Pretty soon you're talking about some real money!

  • It's always nice to know that the US government has an infinite supply of money at its disposal.

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