NY Times: “Obama to Seek More Internet Aid for Schools and Libraries”

UPDATED 5:55pm: Full Text of President Obama’s Remarks
UPDATE 4:35pm: Comment from ALA President Maureen Sullivan
UPDATED 3:15pm: News Release from White House About ConnectedED
UPDATED 3:14pm: The White House has posted about the thoughts the ConnectedED initiative in this blog post.

From The NY Times:

President Obama is expected on Thursday [remarks scheduled at 2:55 PM EDST] to call on the Federal Communications Commission to expand its program to provide discounted high-speed Internet service to schools and libraries, even if it means increasing the fees that are tacked on to consumers’ monthly phone bills.
At an event at a school in Mooresville, N.C., on Thursday, Mr. Obama will ask the F.C.C. to revamp its Schools and Libraries program, known as E-rate, to help provide institutions with Internet speeds of up to 1 Gigabit per second, among the fastest speeds commercially available today.

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As an independent agency, the F.C.C. does not answer directly to the president, although he nominates the F.C.C. chairman. So any changes that the F.C.C. makes to the program’s current structure would have to go through a normal notice-and-comment rule-making procedure and be approved by a majority of the commission members, of which there currently are three, with two seats vacant.

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Schools and libraries that qualify for E-rate support receive discounts of 20 percent to 90 percent on services and equipment, depending on the household income levels of students and the location of the school, whether in urban or rural areas.

Read the Complete Article from the NY Times

On a Related Note…

First education bill in decades acknowledges effective school library programs (via ALA Washington Office)

Track the Bill: S 1094 (Congress.gov) and/or via GovTrack

White House ConnectedED Fact Sheet

Filed under: Associations and Organizations, Libraries, News, School Libraries