40 Time April 6–13, 2020according to a Pew Research Center analysis of 2015
Census Bureau data. Rural communities lag behind
urban areas, as do tribal lands, where about a third of
people d on’t have high-speed Internet, according t o
the Federal Communications Commission.
Dozens o f b roadband companies have signed on
to t he F CC’s Keep Americans Connected pledge for
60 d ays, agreeing to waive late fees, to refrain f rom
terminating service for homes and small businesses
in a rrears on bills and to open wi-fi hot spots. Some
are also offering free Internet to households with K-1 2
and college students and to low-income families who
are new customers.
But advocates have called on them and on the
government to do more. “It still leaves millions of
American children disconnected,” Gigi Sohn, a dis-
tinguished fellow at the Georgetown Law Institute for
Technology Law and Policy, says of the offer. “And by
the way, what happens when the 60 days a re over?”
Sohn, who worked for the FCC under the Obama
Administration and who testified about digital in-
equality b efore Congress in January, s ays in the short
term, the FCC and Congress should increase b road-
band subsidies and make more funds available for
schools a nd l ibraries to provide Internet-enabled de-
vices and hot spots to low-income students. She says
more companies should lift data caps and provide
low-cost broadband options.
“This relief cannot come fast enough,” says Sohn.
Compounding the coronavirus crisis: many families
count on K-12 schools for free or subsidized meals
and other social services a nd rely on colleges for
housing and income from work-study jobs.
By late March, 46 states had closed all schools, and
at least 54.8 million K-12 students were either trying
remote learning or not getting any instruction a t a ll,
according to Education Week. Several districts have
said they might not reopen this school year.
“It’s something I could not in a million years have
imagined having to do,” New York City Mayor Bill
de Blasio said on March 15 when he announced the
closure of the nation’s largest school district. He ac-
knowledged that many households lacked the tech-
nology for digital learning and would suffer economic
hardship if working parents had t o arrange childcare.
The c ity’s department of education is working t o
lend 3 00,000 Internet-enabled iPads to students i n
coming weeks, but thousands did not have t he t ech-
nology needed for remote learning when it began.
Alyssa Roye—the principal of a Brooklyn elemen-
tary school many of whose students live in public
housing—expects it could take weeks for her school’s
roughly 100 students to get the equipment they need
to fully participate in online learning.
In the days leading up to the remote-learning
transition, she called every family with a child in
her s chool t o a sk i f t he h ome had computers and In-
ternet a ccess. Only a handful did. For everyone else,she fi lled o ut a n o nline form for them to request a n
iPad from the department of education.
Her own family’s situation highlights the d ispar-
ities that exist not only between affluent and low-
income school districts but also between schools i n
the same district, where funding is unevenly distrib-
uted and some neighborhoods might benefit from
generous parent donations.
Roye’s two sons have a computer and a t ablet t o
use a t h ome, and they attend public schools in New
York City that were already well equipped for online
learning. Since remote classes began, they have been
able t o l og o n a t t he required times and participate
in video chats with their teachers and classmates.
The p andemic, she says, has made the digital divide
“more glaring than ever.”
In some parts of the country, school officials have
avoided or ended online learning because of those
disparities. “If that’s not available to all c hildren,
we cannot make that available for some,” s aid Wil-
liam R. Hite Jr., the superintendent of Philadelphia
schools, when announcing that students would n ot
be required to submit online assignments.
The Oregon department of education told schools
that i f t hey i mplemented distance learning, it must
be accessible to all students, including those without
Internet access or computers and those with special-
education needs. “You cannot open a ‘brick-and-
mortar’ school in Oregon unless it is accessible to
every student in their school district. The same rules
apply to an online school,” Marc Siegel, spokes person
for the Oregon department of education, s aid i n a n
email. “Online learning in a school district cannot
be i mplemented with an ‘access for some’ mindset.”But even i n some of t he c ountry’s most comfort-
able suburbs near high-tech urban centers, online
equality i s e lusive. Take Bothell, Wash., an affluent
bedroom community near Seattle, which began on-
line l earning o n March 9 for 23,000 students in the
Northshore school district.
For some parents, the transition went smoothly.
Grace Jurado borrowed a couple Chromebooks from
the school district, which had about 4,000 to lend
out, a nd s et t hem up at her dining-room table. Her
three children, in sixth, eighth and 11th grades,
worked through t heir l essons e very day for a week.
One of her daughters recorded YouTube v ideos for
choir. Her son video-chatted with his friends t o fi g-
ure out how to attack their homework assignments.
They all took a break at the end of the day to take
their dogs for a walk.
But Amy Amirault found it impossible to give one-
on-one help to her 14-year-old son Daniel, who has
autism and behavioral challenges, while “running
from kid to kid” to help her three younger children
follow their online classes.
Northshore superintendent Michelle ReidCORONAVIRUS
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