Libraries

Oklahoma is now 95 percent of the way toward reaching statewide connectivity, with Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment builds still ahead. But deploying last-mile broadband networks is just one aspect of closing the digital divide.

For Headlines readers who got nervous for me this morning, I’m fine, but… After five years, today is my last day working at the Benton Institute for Broadband & Society. When I was in college, one of my professors told me to subscribe to a newsletter, Benton’s Daily Digest (or “Headlines,” to me and to many). I thought it was crazy that such a comprehensive resource was published each morning, five days a week. Less than a year later, it became my job to put Headlines together every day.

For more than thirty years, American communications users—really, American consumers—have been charged roughly $1 billion to $3 billion a year to subsidize Internet and related services for schools and libraries through the government's E-Rate program, which is one component of what's called the “Universal Service Fund.” That is a lot of compulsory generosity. Yet only now are policymakers asking the obvious question: Is this money helping students learn—or is it doing harm? Some treat that question as out of bounds. It is not.

A new "consensus-driven roadmap" on the future of the Universal Service Fund argues that universal service should be understood as an ongoing responsibility, not a goal to achieve, and offers six principles for Universal Service Fund reform.

This summer, Oklahoma launched a statewide community access portal initiative, bringing private, internet-connected spaces to public libraries across the state. The program will place as many as 175 portals in libraries, giving rural residents a private space to access telehealth, workforce development, education, and other essential online services. The initiative comes as libraries have taken on an expanding role as community access points for technology and telehealth.

The Federal Communications Commission, which oversees the E-rate program Congress created 30 years ago, has launched a “top-to-bottom” evaluation that has leaders of the nation’s school districts on edge. The FCC is collecting views on how the program should be reformed, or even whether it should be abandoned because it “has fulfilled” its mission. In addition to asking whether the benefit should be restricted to rural districts, the agency links E-Rate to present-day concerns over screen time. Comments are due Oct. 13 and replies are due Nov. 12.

The Schools, Health & Libraries Broadband Coalition and its partners urged the communities that depend on E-Rate to act now. The Federal Communications Commission's proposal to potentially terminate the E-Rate program was published in the Federal Register today, formally starting the clock on the public's chance to respond.

At a new library outside Denver, you can get a book, a pair of snowshoes—and a trail to use them on.

Judges probed the role of the $8 billion-per-year Universal Service Fund and its administrator. Conservative nonprofit Consumers’ Research is challenging the Federal Communications Commission program again, after a defeat at the Supreme Court in 2025. USF supports building and maintaining rural broadband networks, plus voice and internet discounts for low-income households, schools, and healthcare centers.

The stakes for schools, libraries, and health clinics could not be higher. Last year, the Supreme Court delivered us a historic victory in SHLB v. Consumers’ Research when the Court confirmed that the Universal Service Fund, a bipartisan program with a three-decade-long record of connecting communities across rural and urban America, is constitutional. Today we made sure the Fifth Circuit heard from the anchor institutions and the people who depend on this funding to serve their communities.