IfG.CC - The Institute for eGovernment

Schools should take steps to address the digital divide by providing "portable technologies" to be used by children beyond the classroom, Baroness Estelle Morris said on 29 September 2005.

The former education secretary was launching a campaign to bridge the digital divide on behalf of the e-Learning Foundation. The campaign aims to raise awareness across education, in government and the private sector of the impact of the digital divide on young people.

A new report has challenged recent claims by Ofcom that rural areas have better broadband access than city areas.

Thinkbroadband, the UK's largest independent broadband information site, took speed readings from over 13,000 broadband customers and found that rural users suffer a significant shortfall in speeds compared to their city cousins.

The growing digital divide in the UK should be addressed through a mix of better communications infrastructure, IT education courses, employer initiatives and improved government web sites, delegates at an IT skills event yesterday were told.

The event was held at the Department for Business Innovation and Skills to mark the beginning of e-Skills week.

The strategy sets out the crucial role that information and communication technology will have for our future prosperity, and addresses the digital divide which currently excludes some groups from benefiting from access to the internet.

By the end of 2005, all local authorities in England should be capable of online service delivery. This represents a mammoth effort by local and central government, and an investment of £60 million into delivery of the local e-government National Projects. Already, the benefits of digital transformation are being seen in our everyday lives but, unfortunately, these benefits have not extended to all groups in society.

Martha Lane-Fox – recently appointed as the government’s so-called champion for digital inclusion – is attempting to galvanise this stubborn minority. With a nod to the forthcoming Olympics, she has launched an effort called The Race Online 2012. Lane Fox aims to get four million refusniks, most of them on low incomes, using the web.

North Yorkshire, by area the largest county in the UK, is taking its transactional e-services out to remote rural neighbourhoods as part of the latest phase of its e-government programme.

Back in 2002, Gloucester College of Art and Technology (GLOSCAT) faced the challenge of improving ICT and Internet skills across the county, as part of the Government’s drive to bridge the digital divide. Operating in a very rural part of the UK, the college looked at how to deliver computing facilities and Internet access to its outlying communities.

The African continent is the fastest-growing cellular phone market of any region over the last five years, but has not been able to replicate that success with the Internet. Fewer than four out of every 100 Africans have access to the worldwide web.

A new report released today by the Broadband Commission Working Group on Broadband and Gender reveals a 'significant and pervasive' 'tech gap' in access to information and communication technologies (ICTs). Globally, the report estimates that there are currently 200 million fewer women online than men, and warns that the gap could grow to 350 million within the next three years if action is not taken.

Addressing the downside of the modern e-services boom, Hall and Owens warned that progress in the field may cause a countereffect, with wealthier and tech-savvy citizens gaining faster and more hassle-free access to public services, but the underprivileged and less educated classes - who actually might depend more on those services - becoming even more cut off because they lack internet access.

Can streetlights help end the digital divide in cities?

Maybe they can if they’re smart. Qualcomm showed off streetlights at its San Diego campus on Monday that not only dim, brighten and flash red as pedestrians approach crosswalks but also serve as Wi-Fi hotspots.

GovTech checked in with Boston, Mass.; Mesa, Ariz.; and Oakland, Calif., to get a sense of what some of the newest things happening in digital equity are across the country, as cities continue to prioritize the digital divide.

As city leaders across the country continue to prioritize closing the digital divide in their communities, the work continues to evolve.

Over the past few months, the city of Birmingham has helped enroll hundreds of residents in the Affordable Connectivity Program, while increasing digital skills expertise and expanding tech device accessibility through its CONNECT99 campaign.

Officials in Birmingham, Ala., are utilizing a new awareness campaign to break down accessibility barriers to a utility that could impact residents’ ability to land jobs, find educational opportunities and enroll in health care.

Nearly a year into the efforts to mitigate the spread of Covid-19, states continue to weigh whether schools should reopen or keep students home to learn remotely. There’s no easy answer, yet as we undoubtedly see online and hybrid learning models expand, one thing has become abundantly clear: A digital divide persists nationwide. While poverty and municipal infrastructure limitations are root causes, the pandemic has exacerbated this problem as many students and workers have been forced to work from home.

Yet the good news is we have the technology to solve this problem at a community level — and at the same time create a foundation for future smart cities.

A public/private partnership in Tucson, Ariz., is closing the digital divide by not only connecting more than 32,000 of the city’s 212,000 households without reliable internet access, but also powering up Tucson’s smart city strategy.

The city and Insight Enterprises are within weeks of completing Phase I of a municipal wireless broadband solution using the Citizen Broadband Radio Service network, a band of radio-frequency spectrum from 3.5 GHz to 3.7 GHz that the Federal Communications Commission has designated for incumbent, priority and general authorized access. Insight’s Cloud + Data Center Transformation team provides project management and long-term managed services over the single solution that combines technologies from multiple providers.