Summer-Fall 2001

With a new administration in Washington and changes underway, it is important to reflect on the past decade’s achievements —a reminder of how far we’ve come and to stiffen our resolve for the changes ahead.

• Accomplishment Number One: We’ve bridged the digital divide in our schools—almost. In the early nineties, data showed that students in wealthier districts were gaining access to educational technology tools faster than poor students. President Clinton and Vice President Gore issued a Technology Literacy Challenge, and backed the rhetoric up with a budgetary blitzkrieg.

U.S. Department of Education ed tech funding rose to $872 million in 2001, a 3700 percent increase from the $23 million appropriated in 1993. With the addition of billions of dollars in E-rate funding and an army of mobilized NetDay volunteers, the percentage of schools connected to the Internet increased rapidly, from 35 percent in 1994 to 98 percent in 2000. However, gaps still persist. For example, 82 percent of instructional rooms have Internet access in schools with the lowest concentration of poor students, compared to 60 percent of the rooms in schools with the highest concentrations of students in poverty.

• Accomplishment Number Two: We’ve heightened the world’s awareness about individual, community, and national digital divides and efforts to bridge them.

From the seminal Benton Foundation study, Losing Ground Bit by Bit: Low Income Communities in the Digital Age and Department of Commerce data and studies to the PBS digital divide series, we’ve become more aware of the nature of the technological gaps that exist and persist in our society.

We know that home Internet access is growing rapidly but saturated only in upper-income households. We know the fault lines include educational attainment, occupation, race, gender, age, and geography. We’ve learned that, in contrast to those who see the digital divide as a benign and ephemeral delay in the diffusion of technology, the impact of these lag times is highly detrimental for disadvantaged communities.

• Accomplishment Number Three: With the hard work of organizers at the local level, and funding from the corporate and federal level, we’ve created a vast array of Community Technology Access Points (CAPs).

From its humble beginnings at the Playing to Win community technology center in Harlem, the National Science Foundation funded a catalyst for the creation and expansion of CAPs in the form CTCNet. Funding from Commerce’s Technology Opportunity Program helped a number of CAPs become showcase sites and models that others could emulate. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development launched a major effort to put Neighborhood Network centers in section 8 housing. The Gates Foundation and E-rate provided an enormous infusion of capital to help libraries become portals to digital opportunity. Further assistance came in the form of the new U.S. Department of Education’s Community Technology Centers program and the 21st Century Learning Centers Program, providing resources for after-school CAP programming. Corporate programs have recently popped up, like PowerUP and Intel’s Computer Clubhouse.

The Benton Foundation’s Digital Divide Network has become an important communications channel for activity in this arena and, with the recent launch of the Connectado campaign, a source for information on why, how, and where Americans can get connected.

• Conclusion: While great strides have been made in the last decade the road ahead is full of challenges. Between the new Republican administration in Washington, and the slumping economy, many who run community technology programs are worried that their government and corporate funding will dry up.

With computer prices low and Internet access cheap or free, some question the need for community technology centers. Now is an important time to look hard at mission statements, business plans, and one’s sustainability model. Even when we reach our national goal of every household connected, community technology centers will still have a vital role to play.