The Federal Communications Commission committed $37.7 million in a new funding round through the Emergency Connectivity Fund Program, which provides digital tools and services to support students in communities across the country. This funding commitment supports applications from the third application window, benefitting approximately 100,000 students nationwide, including students in Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Texas, and Washington. This funding commitment supports approximately 220 schools and school districts, 2 library systems, and 4 consortia. The funding can be used to support off-campus learning, such as nightly homework, and online learning programs to ensure students across the country have the necessary support to keep up with their education. Approximately $7.03 billion in ECF funding commitments have been approved to date providing support to over 18 million students, 11,400 schools, 1,060 libraries, and 125 consortia, and provided nearly 13 million connected devices and over 8 million broadband connections.

The debate around “net neutrality” is back, only this time there is even less chance that the matter will be settled for good. Consumers’ online rights still need protection, and restoring them for an open internet is worthwhile. Those pointing to internet service providers’ (ISP) “good behavior” are being disingenuous at best. The 2018 decision to reverse the Federal Communications Commission's earlier net neutrality rule was being challenged in court until 2020, by which point several states had set up or had in motion their own net neutrality regulations in the absence of a federal one. The patchwork of rules has placed ISPs in regulatory limbo for six years: “Good behavior” was the only practical option available—and calling it that is maybe a stretch. During the pandemic, the FCC had to rely on voluntary pledges from ISPs to keep people connected in the crisis, but many were still disconnected, noted New America’s Open Technology Institute's Senior Policy Counsel Raza Panjwani. Onerous data caps were temporarily dropped to support the surge of at-home working but were soon reinstated long before people started going back to the office en masse. Now, the government lacks the ability to thoroughly and consistently measure how ISPs are performing, so we don’t have a full picture of how Americans are being served, according to Public Knowledge Senior VP Harold Feld. A return to so-called Title II classification, in which broadband access is regulated like utilities such as water and gas, would help address much of the above, which is why President Joe Biden has made it a priority.

The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) is working to foster the development of an open 5G wireless ecosystem to help the private sector bring new life and innovation to a marketplace held back by few vendors and little competition. NTIA's 5G lab at the Institute for Telecommunication Sciences, partnered with the Department of Defense for the 2023 5G Challenge. The 2023 5G Challenge tested whether an open 5G ecosystem can work in real world scenarios. Flexibility is a necessity for Open Radio Access Network (Open RAN) technology but caused difficulties for the 2022 5G Challenge contestants. While their subsystems complied with different sets of standards and specifications, contestant subsystems did not have a standard set of optional features, which caused inconsistencies. As a result, in 2023 the host lab facilitated pre-integration coordination. Overall, this enabled multi-vendor integration and resulted in an increase in successful end-to-end multi-vendor integrations from one in 2022 to four in 2023. The 5G Challenge has identified a need for a clear baseline for industry Open RAN integration specifications and lab venues for vetting these specifications. The winners of the challenge have set a new benchmark for industry collaboration to bring innovation and competition to the mobile equip.

Jason Kronemeyer, the Director of Technology at Eastern Upper Peninsula Intermediate School District (EUPISD), has been relentlessly working towards enhancing educational outcomes in the region. Along the way, he grew into the role of a broadband champion. Jason's fervent desire to accelerate student learning, coupled with unconventional strategies of “connecting the dots” over decades have played an essential role in attracting infrastructure construction and driving broadband adoption. His dedicated efforts have contributed to millions in infrastructure grant awards, and has attracted multiple internet service providers (ISPs) to the Eastern Upper Peninsula.  Jason recently disclosed his plans to retire in the near future. As he reflects on his career, his achievements in the Eastern Upper Peninsula are entwined with a measure of regret. "I'm into the second half of my 25th year, and it seems like we’re just getting started," he remarked. Jason strongly believes his ability to educate, communicate and inspire has had a substantial influence and empowered students to excel. "I'm confident that I've made a significant impact, and I hope that my successor will be as deeply committed to the community as I have been," he added.

[ Dr. Pierrette Renee Dagg, Ph.D is a Benton Institute Digital Opportunity Fund Fellow and the Director of Technology Impact Research at Merit Network.]

Shenandoah Telecommunications Company (Shentel) is employing Render Networks' construction management platform to handle the fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) expansions for its Glo Fiber brand—which offers multi-gigabit broadband internet access, live streaming TV and digital home phone service in183,000 households across Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Maryland. Render's platform will be used in all markets where Shentel is building, and is already in three markets right now. The network construction platform leverages geospatial, task-level data for automation. Shentel will also tap into its quality assurance features to enable construction teams to review and validate data and photos captured as work is completed. Specifically, Render’s platform will enable Shentel to break projects into more manageable sections for construction crews. Shentel has set a goal of 450,000 fiber homes passed by the end of 2026, and has been steadily picking up funding along the way.