Reporting

As fall semester gets into full swing in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, schools are noticing a concerning trend: Low-income students are the most likely to drop out or not enroll at all, raising fears that they might never get a college degree.

President Donald Trump announced the nomination of Nathan Simington, who is currently a senior advisor in the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, to replace Michel O'Rielly on the Federal Communications Commission.

Prior to the pandemic and resulting shift to distance learning, the St. Paul Public Schools district had already deployed a one-to-one iPad program, districtwide. District staff still had to troubleshoot internet access issues with families — and efforts have been made to help deliver hotspots and devices to students who may be doubled up with other families in neighboring communities.

When it came to naming the company's top-priorities, AT&T CEO John Stankey said adding more fiber topped the list. AT&T's second key priority is making sure that it has broadband connectivity on 5G, which means even more fiber. Stankey said anything AT&T could do to put more fiber out into the network was a top priority because fiber fuels both the consumer and business segments.

Verizon has recently completed lab trials with Corning and begun lab trials with Samsung on new 5G mmWave in-building solutions which, when commercially launched, will provide 5G mmWave coverage inside facilities such as hospitals, manufacturing facilities, warehouses, schools, ports, retail stores and more. The launch of these indoor cell sites will not only extend the footprint of Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband network, but will also bring the promise of private networks with Mobile Edge Compute (MEC) capabilities one step closer.

Top House Democrats outlined aspirations to tackle broadband issues in 2021 under what they hope is President Joe Biden. “I promise you all we will restore net neutrality and make our broadband networks more competitive,” said Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA), who chairs the House telecom subcommittee and envisions continuing to do so. If President Donald Trump wins re-election, the digital divide will widen, Chairman Doyle added.

Comcast is poised to deliver a record quarter of broadband subscriber gains as the media giant slowly pulls out of the economic trench caused by the pandemic.

President Donald Trump, pressing for new social media regulations, plans to nominate a senior administration official to be a member of the Federal Communications Commission. The nomination of Nathan Simington, a senior adviser at the Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration, comes after the White House abruptly announced in early August it was withdrawing the nomination of FCC Commissioner Mike O’Rielly to serve another term.

Lawmakers from both parties sharply criticized Google over its dominance in advertising at a Senate hearing that showcased the arguments likely to play out if the government moves to sue the tech giant for anticompetitive practices. The senators were particularly focused on Google’s dominant position at every step in the chain of technology that connects web publishers with advertisers, and on the ways Google has used the market power it wields through it

Mayor Byron Brown’s office wants to address some of the broadband issues in Buffalo, New York, but first it needs to figure out what those issues are. One of those broad issues is basic access. According to the latest American Communities survey from the U.S. Census Bureau, between 20 to 30 percent of city residents don’t have a broadband internet subscription at home. "It’s a significant problem," said Brendan Mehaffy, Executive Director of the Office of Strategic Planning for the City of Buffalo.