Education Week - April 13, 2016 - 12

DIGITAL DIRECTIONS > Tracking news and ideas in educational technology
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Solving 'Homework Gap' Is Key Goal
In FCC Expansion of Broadband Plan
originally adopted more than three decades ago, had previously covered only
voice services.
"Technologies may change, but the
role that communications services play
in bringing communities together and
bridging divides remains as vital as it
was in 1985," said Commissioner Mignon Clyburn, a driving force behind
Lifeline modernization.
Clyburn was joined by Commissioner
Jessica Rosenworcel and Chairman Tom
Wheeler, all Democrats, in a 3-2 partyline vote in support of the new proposal.
Despite agreeing in principle that Lifeline should subsidize broadband access,
the FCC's two Republican commissioners,
Michael O'Reilly and Ajit Pai, both voted
against the plan. Their main beef: the
program's lack of hard spending limits.
"This agency in this proceeding represented the worst of government," said
Pai, who argued that the proposal as adopted was flawed and would fail to clean
up waste, fraud, and abuse.

Seeking Digital Equity
For more than a year, many educators and education technology proponents had watched the Lifeline debate
closely, arguing that the inclusion of
broadband in the program was key to
supporting digital equity.
One in 5 Americans currently lack
broadband access at home, and the vast
majority of those who remain disconnected are poor.
At the same time, however, schools are
going increasingly digital, with surveys indicating that 7 in 10 teachers now assign
homework online.
James P. Steyer, the founder and CEO
of Common Sense Media, a Californiabased nonprofit advocacy group, was
among those who were thrilled with the
commission's vote. "The FCC has helped
to advance our understanding that access to high-speed Internet is not a luxury, it is a necessity," Steyer said. "Three
cheers for the FCC for taking America
one step closer toward digital equality
and closing the pernicious homework
gap that leaves millions of low-income
children at a disadvantage in education
and in life."
Home broadband access is also viewed
as increasingly essential for job searches,
accessing public services, and participating in civic life.
As a result, more than 200 school district leaders and hundreds of advocacy
groups, ranging from the Alliance for
Excellent Education to the Leadership
Conference on Civil and Human Rights
to the American Library Association,
pushed hard for more than a year to
expand the Lifeline subsidy to include
broadband.
"Millions of families' lives will be improved," said Jessica Gonzales, the executive vice president and general counsel of
the National Hispanic Media Coalition, a
civil rights advocacy organization. "We're
giving families the tools to better their
lives and lift themselves out of poverty."

Still, some experts urged caution
when predicting the likely impact of
Lifeline modernization.
"Even if people who didn't have it before do end up getting home broadband
through this [initiative], it's a big leap
of faith to assume that they'll then use
the Internet in a way that will be beneficial to them," said Esczter Hargittai, a
professor of communications studies at
Northwestern University. "There is lots
of research that has shown that people
from less-privileged backgrounds, even
when you control for having access, use
the Internet less [frequently than more
affluent individuals] for activities such

Millions of families'
lives will be improved.
We're giving families
the tools to better
their lives and lift
themselves out
of poverty."
JESSICA GONZALES
National Hispanic Media Coalition

as job searches and civic engagement."
Hargittai called for more robust federal data collection. "If we're spending
this kind of money on subsidizing broadband access, we need to know what's
happening in terms of usage," she said.
When it comes to implementation,
support for the program's new mobilebroadband requirement will be phased
in over five years.
The program will also now include
minimum service standards-an issue
that some telecommunications companies and industry groups had resisted.
Lifeline broadband providers will be
required to offer fixed speeds currently
set at 10 megabits-per-second for download and 1 mbps for upload. Those offering mobile broadband service will be required to offer at least 500 MB per month
of 3G data by Dec. 1 (a standard that will
gradually rise to 2 GB per month by the
end of 2018.) Providers of mobile voice
service will be required to offer at least
500 minutes per month by Dec. 1 (a standard that will rise to 1,000 minutes per
month by the end of 2018.)
Opponents of the new plan argued
that those standards could unintentionally lead to higher prices and lowincome families losing access to subsidies for phone service. "The concern is
that it will decrease participation on
both the recipient and carrier sides,"
said Doug Brake, a telecommunications-policy analyst for the Information
Technology and Innovation Foundation. "We think this is overly paternalistic, and that consumers should [have
been] able to take a simple voucher

12 | EDUCATION WEEK | April 13, 2016 | www.edweek.org

and apply it to the communications
service that best suits their situation."
Another contentious issue involved
budget limits. The commission's Republican members pushed hard for
a firm spending cap, even saying that
a bipartisan deal was in place for
a $1.75 billion limit on the morning
of the vote.
But that agreement fell apart amid
delays and recriminations. The modernization order ultimately adopted
purports to set an annual budget of
$2.25 billion, indexed to inflation, but
does so without a strong mechanism
for enforcing that spending limit. If
disbursements through the program
should reach 90 percent of that figure in any given year, the commission
would be required to prepare an analysis with recommended actions for the
FCC to consider.
GOP Commissioner O'Reilly denounced that "mechanism" as "a joke,
not a budget."

Competition and Choice
Also a matter of dispute in the lead
up to the vote was the creation of a
national, independent, third-party
entity to determine participants'
eligibility for the program by crosschecking their status against verified
government databases, a strategy the
commission ultimately approved. Previously, providers themselves were responsible for determining participant
eligibility-a reality that many said
contributed to extensive waste and
fraud in the program.
"The fox is no longer guarding the hen
house," said Chairman Wheeler.
The Lifeline modernization vote
comes little more than a year after the
FCC's decision to overhaul the federal
E-rate program, dramatically expanding support for broadband and Wi-Fi
service inside school buildings.
In both instances, Wheeler maintained
that the commission was guided by the
principles of competition and choice.
"Reforms are designed to encourage
more providers to participate in the program so that competition in the marketplace can increase the value of the
subsidy and provide choices for consumers," he said of the Lifeline vote,
in a statement.
"By dramatically improving Lifeline's management and design,
and putting the program on sound
fiscal footing moving forward, we
will help low-income Americans all
across our nation connect to the Internet and the opportunities of the
broadband revolution."

NEXT STEPS FOR LIFELINE
Highlights of the Federal Communications
Commission's plan to modernize the
Lifeline program include:
XPANDING LIFELINE SUBSIDIES TO COVER
E
BROADBAND. Eligible low-income families
will now be able to use the program's
$9.25 monthly subsidy to pay for
stand-alone mobile or fixed broadband
Internet access, as well as bundled
voice-and-data plans.
STABLISHING MINIMUM SERVICE
E
REQUIREMENTS. Lifeline broadband
providers will now be required to meet
minimum speeds and standards,
starting at 500 MB per month of data
or 500 minutes of voice service.
BUILDING IN THIRD-PARTY ELIGIBILITY
VERIFICATION. A new, independent National
Eligibility Verifier will determine if program
participants can receive Lifeline benefits
by validating their eligibility using existing
government databases. Previously, providers
were responsible for determining eligibility,
creating incentives for fraud and abuse.
REATING A 'BUDGET MECHANISM'
C
TO MONITOR SPENDING. Lifeline will
continue with no firm spending cap,
but the program will be guided by
a $2.25 billion annual budget figure.
If spending should reach 90 percent
of that figure, the commission's Wireline
Competition Bureau will be required
to prepare an analysis of the causes
of spending growth and recommend
actions for the FCC to consider.
SOURCE: Federal Communications Commission

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Education Week - April 13, 2016

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