Funding for broadband in North Carolina called a 'game changer'

We've been following the stimulus package broadband awards, several of which have gone to rural schools. Now some rural advocates say these awards could be key to altering "the playing field for rural schools and the communities they serve," Mary Schulken of Education Week reports on the Rural Education blog. "The grants and projects vary widely, from funding fixed wireless broadband in Michigan to providing mobile broadband access to rural Alabama," Schulken writes. "Yet all the projects focus primarily on unserved or underserved communities and in many instances will provide discounted service to anchor institutions in communities such as schools and libraries."

"The [Broadband Technology Opportunities Program] award is truly a game changer for North Carolina," Erskine Bowles, president of the University of North Carolina system, told Schulken of a $75.8 million grant announced last week for North Carolina from the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Bowles, who chaired a rural prosperity task force 11 years ago that set blanket broadband access for students and households as a top priority, told Schulken the award was "the most significant event toward meeting this goal since it was crafted a decade ago."

"When the [stimulus package] broadband money was debated in Washington, not everyone thought spending money to connect rural communities offered as much promise as Bowles' remarks suggest," Schulken writes, pointing to a National Public Radio story from 2009. "Yet the money rolls, bringing jobs and, perhaps more significant in the long-term, bandwidth and speed," Schulken concludes. (Read more)