For most of us, the Internet is a necessity. For many of us, that means broadband except in some schools.
A new report claims only 10 percent of the state’s kindergarten-through-12th-grade schools have access to high-speed Internet through the federal E-Rate program from 2009 to 2013.
“They’re probably right,” says Phil Halstead, executive director of the Partnership for a Connected Illinois. “The overall challenge is to get broad connectivity to those Illinois schools that do not have it.”
It won’t come cheap. Halstead says $179 million stands between broadband and the state’s least connected 93,000 Illinois students.
More information of the study may be found at Partnership for a Connected Illinois.