On Sept 17, 2020, 36 Democratic and 2 Independent Senators wrote to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Ajit Pai to demand that the FCC take immediate action to help children who lack internet access at home and are unable to participate in online learning. Specifically, they called on Chairman Pai to utilize the E-Rate program to close this "homework gap" without further delay.

Hundreds of school-age children in suburban Cook County (IL)  public housing will get free laptops paid for by federal coronavirus stimulus money starting Oct 7, as part of an ongoing effort to ensure digital access after the COVID-19 pandemic upended in-person learning. About $270,000 of CARES Act money allocated to the Housing Authority of Cook County (HACC) will be used to purchase laptops for 900 students who live in the public housing complexes to keep and otherwise would struggle to complete remote learning.

31% of Black households do not have high-speed home broadband, affecting Black school-aged children and their ability to complete homework assignments at a disproportionate rate.

It’s become clear to teachers, administrators, and community members that the digital divide is too big for schools to bridge on their own. The infrastructure needed to teach rural students remotely would require systemic change — it would require government assistance. Months into the pandemic, educators say they still don’t have what they need.

Melissa Lawson does whatever she can to ensure her children have a great education. The single mom of three juggles working as a licensed cosmetologist, a Zumba instructor and a school’s lunch and recess monitor while ensuring she has the money to keep her children at Sister Thea Bowman Catholic School and Gibault Catholic High School. But now that Lawson’s children are remote learning this school year, she’s had to double her efforts because she can’t afford internet service in her home. She leaves her phone with her kids while she goes to work so they can use her hotspot for school.

Attending college during the coronavirus has meant added costs. And the digital divide that was a problem for many students last academic year hasn’t disappeared. In fact, with the fall semester already underway, institutions are still working to assess and overcome the gaps in technology for students. 57 percent of college students said that having access to a stable, high-speed internet connection could be challenging if they continued their education online. For the most vulnerable students, a lack of access to the internet and a computer could keep them from enrolling.

In exploring the principles behind democratic health communications around the world, South Korea and Taiwan stood out for their use of technology both to understand what their citizens were thinking and to prevent the health disinformation spreading as it did in Europe and North America. Their experiences in dealing with the infodemic provide five important lessons for policymakers:

A $100 million program to increase internet usage among low-income Alabama families during the pandemic has gone mostly unused, and the state is sending 300,000 more vouchers in a search for additional takers. While 75,000 students have gained internet access so far through the program, which seeks to make it easier for students to get online for school, around 450,000 students qualify statewide, said Mike Presley, spokesman for the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs. The second round of vouchers is being sent by a state contractor to increase participation.

The Federal Communications Commission announced that it will address 2019’s court remand of key elements of the FCC’s rollback of net neutrality. In particular, the court decision took the agency to task for disregarding its duty to consider how the FCC’s decision threatened public safety, service for low-income households, and broadband infrastructure. Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel said, “This is crazy. The internet should be open and available for all...Now the courts have asked us for a do-over.

This week, House Democrats unveiled (and later passed) an updated version of the HEROES Act, a pandemic-relief bill the House passed in May, but was never considered by the U.S. Senate. The original Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions (HEROES) Act included a number of provisions aimed at getting and keeping more people in the U.S. connected and safe during the pandemic.