Eliminate the Digital Divide

Digital Divide Funding and the Power of Public Meetings

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Here’s a story in the Chicago Tribune about the proposed cuts in state funding for the Eliminate the Digital Divide grant program: Proposed Illinois budget threatens digital literacy program. Here’s a snip related to the impact of the proposed cuts in Chicago:

Michael Matos, director of adult education programs for Albany Park Community Center in Chicago, said elimination of the program would hurt people who “do not typically have opportunities to use computers in their everyday lives, for advancing in the workplace, or to progress in their education.” Matos said many are “low-income families and individuals, limited-English immigrants, especially Hispanics, adults with limited education, and unemployed and underemployed individuals,” including military veterans.

“If the Eliminate the Digital Divide program didn’t receive funding for fiscal year 2016, we would have to discontinue eight training classes that run every six weeks and 12 hours weekly of open community access to the computer technology center,” Matos said.

Matos said about 1,800 people use the center, funded mostly by a $75,000 grant that ends in June.

The State of Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity has been an enormously important funder in this space. People and organizations all across the state have relied on these funds to improve skills, get job training, and generally improve their lives.

Here at Smart Chicago, access to technology & the internet and digital skills for all are important areas of focus. The Connect Chicago Challenge,  an effort to make Chicago the most dynamic digital city in the country, aligns citywide digital leadership to coordinate and activate digital access and skills development interventions to enable every Chicagoan to fully participate in digital society.

This is an important issue that affects us all. Here’s a helpful cache of public documents about the work of the committee and grantees of the program, including up-to-date notes about the current status of funding and the results of a recent meeting of the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee.

The reporter who wrote this story attended a public meeting held by this committee last week. She joined dozens of people, in person and on the phone, who work in this nascent field. As chair of the committee, I shared my thoughts on the cuts:

Dan O’Neil, an advisory committee member who also is executive director of Smart Chicago Collaborative, whose mission is to increase Internet access, said at the meeting that he believes funding should be doubled.

The digital divide is most certainly not closed, the work is not even close to done, and the librarians, social workers, and trainers who serve on the front lines deserve our support.

Kennedy-King College Public Computer Centers

Kennedy-King College Public Computer Centers

This Morning: Eliminate the Digital Divide Advisory Committee Meeting

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seal-of-the-state-of-illinoisThis morning, Wednesday, March 11, 2015,  at 10AM, I will be chairing a meeting of the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee in the Director’s Conference Room of the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) in Suite 3-400 of the State of Illinois Building at 100 W. Randolph Street, Chicago, IL 60601. If you want to dial in, you can do so at 1-888-494-4032  / Access #: 2828938287.

Here’s the agenda:

Meeting Agenda

  1. Call to Order
  2. Program Update
  3. Other Business/Public Comment
  4. Adjournment

Here’s a helpful cache of public documents about the work of the committee and grantees of the program.

Under the “Other Business/Public Comment” portion of the meeting, I’ll ask for clarification from DCEO about the discontinuation of the Eliminate the Digital Divide Program. Here’s an excerpt from page 58 of the Illinois State Budget, Fiscal Year 2016, July 1, 2015 – June 30, 2016:

In order to restructure the state’s limited resources to core priorities and to provide funding for an overall budget that the state can afford, the fiscal year 2016 recommended budget discontinues funding from the fiscal year 2016 maintenance request: the Office of Coal Marketing and Development and its programs ($25 million); the state add-on to the federal LIHEAP ($165 million); the Energy Efficiency Portfolio Standards Program ($100 million); the Renewable Energy Program ($10 million); the Summer Youth Jobs Program ($10 million); and the Eliminate the Digital Divide Program ($5 million).

Since inception, this program has invested circa $30 million in the digital lives of Illinois residents. All the way up and down this state, these funds have led to tens of thousands of people (page 254) getting trained in digital skills at Community Technology Centers.

If you believe in the power of technology to improve lives, if you think we should support the essential work of front-line trainers in this state, if you care about equity in opportunity for all residents of Illinois, this is something that matters to you.

Thoughts on the Gigabit City Summit

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Last week, I traveled with Kyla Williams, Sonja Marziano, and Christopher Whitaker to Kansas City, MO for the Gigabit City Summit – A three-day learning and networking opportunity exclusively designed for leaders in current and emerging Gigabit Cities.

Gigabit CIty Summit

Gigabit City Summit

The host city of Kansas City was chosen to be the first city with Google Fiber. Gigabit cities have internet download speeds of up to one gigabit of data per second. To compare, Chicago has an average internet download speed of 23 mbs/s. Clearly, this gives Kansas City a significant advantage.

There are many technology solutions that are limited by the bandwidth currently available in most homes and businesses. Gigabit speeds allow developers to use much more data and information to power their apps. It’s not just making Netflix load faster – there are several examples of applications that only work with gigabit speeds. This line of technological development would have huge impact into economic development as gigabit speeds would attract high tech companies.

At the other end of the spectrum, are advocates in cities who see gigabit internet as a way to close the digital divide. Gigabit internet requires substantial investment in infrastructure and the process of adding the necessary fiber lines can be a boon for digital access. This can be used for the delivery of regular Internet connections via wifi and other less speedy but still critical modes.

At Smart Chicago we care about digital access and digital skills, so we care about the city-based networks that are necessary to support people. That’s why we sent a whole delegation to Kansas City— so that we can share our model with others who toil in these fields.

We’ve got a pretty good history of this, including co-hosting a US Ignite conference in June 2013. This long-form attention is critical to our work— we don’t give up.

I was impressed with at the conference was the effort that Kansas City took to ensure they used the project to both connect every neighborhood with fiber and make serious investments into digital literacy.

Mayor Sly James of Kansas City, MO delivering the welcome at the Gigabit City Summit

Mayor Sly James of Kansas City, MO delivering the welcome at the Gigabit City Summit

In 2012, the Mayors’ Bistate Innovation Team published the playbook “Playing to win in America’s Digital Crossroads.” The team, made up of experts from both Kansas City, MO and Kansas City, KC, had begun to work on the playbook after the announcement that Kansas City would be the first metro area with Google Fiber.

Right from the beginning the playbook made digital inclusion a priority stating, “high-speed fiber can not reach it’s potential if large segments of society are excluded from it’s benefits.”

One of the ways that Kansas City is working to ensure digital inclusion is the Digital Inclusion Fund.  It is housed at the Greater Kansas City Community Foundation and made possible by Google Fiber, the Sprint Foundation, The Illig Family Foundation, Polsinelli, Global Prairie and JE Dunn. In 2013, they spent $311,600 on digital literacy programs in Kansas City.

Kansas City also has programs that provide refurbished computers to low-income residents thanks to the work being done by Connecting for Good.

This one-two punch goes a long way to bridging the digital divide in Kansas City.

The story of how gigabit internet impacts education 

The Gigabit City Summit also featured an education track to discuss education’s role in building a smart connected city.

For this track, the conference organizers invited teachers from the area to participate in the Summit. The group discussed STEM education, job skills, and next generation learning.

There are several apps that take advantage of gigabit speeds to help in the classroom. One of our favorite examples is the software lending library that allows Kansas City residents to use their gigabit connections to go onto the library’s servers and use commercial software like Photoshop and Microsoft Office from their home computers.

President Obama’s big push for gigabit internet 

One of the big challenges with generating greater speeds and access is lack of competition among internet providers. Communities like Burlington, Vermont decided to tackle this issue by just building their own network. The city provides gigabit broadband in the same way that they provide water to residents.

Larger cable and internet companies have pushed to have laws passed in states to forbid the practice.

Last week, during the conference, the White House released a report about the benefits of community broadband solutions  and the President came out in full support of net neutrality, gigabit internet, and community-based broadband solutions. President Obama also announced several federal initiatives help cities get gigabit internet including expanding grants and loans to help expand broadband internet to rural communities.Here’s the President on the issue:

Susan Crawford’s passionate call for equal access to high speed internet

The Summit’s keynote was author Susan Crawford. Crawford spoke about how access to reliable high speed internet is a social justice issue. She linked the current struggle for high speed internet for all with the electrification debates in the 1920’s and how it took federal intervention ensure that all homes were provided with electricity.

Crawford praised the President’s plan to knock down the federal regulations that make it more difficult for cities to build their own gigabit networks. She called the speech “Obama’s FDR moment” and spoke about how there is no better time to be building fiber in America.

It’s hard to capsulize Susan’s Crawford into a single blog post – so we definitely recommend checking out her book Captive Audience.

There’s more work to do

There’s a lot more work do to when it comes to ensuring every resident of Chicago has the access and skills needed to take full advantage of the power of the internet. In 2015, we’re going to be going to be launching additional initiatives to help bridge the digital divide here in Chicago. Join us!

The Next Eliminate the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee Meeting is February 3, 2015

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seal-of-the-state-of-illinoisThe next meeting of the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee is Tuesday, February 3, 2015 from 10:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m at 100 W. Randolph St. Ste. 3-400 Chicago, IL 60601.

This is on the third floor in the offices of the Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity in the Director’s Conference Room.

Meeting Agenda as follows:

I. Call to Order

II. Program Update

III. Other Business/Public Comment

IV. Adjournment

Call in information: Dial-in #: 1-888-494-4032 Access #: 2828938287

I’m currently the chair of this committee and I’ve maintained a folder of information about its work here.

Attend the Next Meeting of the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee

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The next meeting of the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee of the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity is coming up. Details as follows:

Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee
James R. Thompson Center 100 W. Randolph
St. Ste. 3-400
(Director’s Conference Room)
Chicago, IL 60601

Thursday, November 6, 2014
10:00 am – 11:30 a.m.

Dial-in # 1-888-494-4032 Access #2828938287

Here’s a folder of documents relating to the Committee’s work since I became chair. And here’s some relevant documents for our meeting:

Meantime, here’s a photo I took when I was in Springfield recently:

Old Capitol, Springfield, IL

Eliminate the Digital Divide Advisory Committee Capstone Project

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uic_logo_large_blue_revI serve as the chair of the Eliminate the Digital Divide Advisory Committee of the State of Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Development. Recently I worked with fellow committee member Norm Peterson of Argonne National Laboratory to submit an application under the University of Illinois at Chicago Department of Public Administration MPA Capstone program, “which provides MPA students with a practical, team-based experience in problem-solving within public or nonprofit organizations”.

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Eliminate the Digital Divide Advisory Committee Working Meeting

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I chair the Eliminate the Digital Divide Advisory Committee , which advises the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity in establishing criteria and procedures for identifying recipients of grants under the Digital Divide Elimination Act.

Here’s meeting notes: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1CF6J9L_uG0xCR5AgbC3_IMMfK76lUlo2lxGQOLqQcXA/edit

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Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee Meeting

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Join us this morning at the Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee.

Digital Divide Elimination Advisory Committee
James R. Thompson Center 100 W. Randolph St.
Ste. 3-400 (Director’s Conference Room)
Chicago, IL 60601
Monday, May 12, 2014 10:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.

Meeting Agenda
I. Call to Order
II. Approval of Committee Meeting Minutes from February 10, 2014 meeting
III. Program Update
IV. Other Business/Public Comment
V. Adjournment

If you can’t make it today, the next two meetings are as follows:

  • Monday, August 11, 2014 @ 10:00 a.m.
  • Monday, November 10, 2014 @ 10:00 a.m.

Toolkit: Flash Drives as a Key for Digital Access and Productivity

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When we think of digital access, most of us assume that we’re talking about access to the internet. However, there is more than digital access than just being able to go to a public computing center. Portable storage like flash drives play a vital role in allowing people to take advantage of technology. This is one story that illustrates the value of flash drives in an urban public computing center environment.

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