Education, training key to widespread broadband adoption

IDG News Service - The U.S. needs local education and training programs and better computer reuse programs to overcome a large broadband adoption gap, speakers at a broadband adoption forum said Tuesday.

About 95% of U.S. households have wired broadband available to them, but only about 65% subscribe, according to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission. While the cost of broadband is an issue for some U.S. residents, more people who haven't subscribed question whether they need broadband, said John Horrigan, the FCC's consumer research director, speaking at the Roadmap to Broadband Adoption forum.

Programs that show nonsubscribers the relevance of broadband can work, said Elisabeth Stock, co-founder and CEO of Computers For Youth, a nonprofit that focuses on online educational opportunities for middle-school students in New York City and other urban areas. About 29% of the households at one Atlanta school had Internet access before Computers For Youth began working there, and two months after launching the program, 61% of the households had access, she said.

"The relevance of broadband, as well as digital literacy, accounts for more of why people are not adopters than does cost," Stock said. "Even without addressing cost, you can have a pretty big impact."

Several speakers at the forum talked about the need for education and training programs to be community-based, instead of a top-down approach from government or other organizations. While the FCC and other U.S. agencies can provide assistance, and in some cases, funding, decisions to subscribe to broadband are often based on local conditions, said Karen Archer Perry, a member of the FCC's National Broadband Task Force.

"If people in my neighborhood adopt broadband, it's likely that I will, too," she said.

The FCC, in its national broadband plan released in March, proposed a volunteer National Digital Literacy Corps that would work with local organizations to train prospective broadband users. If U.S. residents want the program, they will have to convince the U.S. Congress to fund it, with the cost of about US$100 million, Perry said.

The U.S. has traditionally resisted partnerships between private groups and government to solve problems, unlike many other countries, but those attitudes seem to be changing, added Rick Herrmann, director of U.S. public sector initiatives for Intel.

"What we do really well is from the bottom up," he added. "It's in our local communities. Our ability to innovate, replicate and iterate on that innovation constantly is what we do well and where we need to focus our efforts."

Schools need help in their efforts to educate students and families about the importance of broadband, Herrmann added. Too often, teachers are putting in extra hours as their schools' IT staff, he said.