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Hawaii and Kentucky are Among States That Lead the Way in Connectivity

The second annual “State of the States” report on the state of broadband connectivity in United States schools finds a number of states are leading the way in ensuring that their students have access to equal educational opportunities provided by technology.

The report was issued Monday by EducationSuperHighway, a national nonprofit focused on upgrading the internet access in every public school classroom in America.

Among the highlights of the report, every student in Hawaii, Kentucky, North Dakota, South Carolina and Wyoming meets the minimum connectivity goal of 100 kilobits per second (kbps) per student — meaning that every child in these states can take advantage of digital learning. Meanwhile, Kentucky and Hawaii also join Delaware, Tennessee and West Virginia in having every school connected to high-speed fiber — the infrastructure that will allow their school districts to increase bandwidth over time to keep up with demand, according to a news release.

Here are some of the top performing states in 2016:

States with all school districts meeting the minimum school connectivity goal:

  • Hawaii
  • Kentucky
  • North Dakota
  • South Carolina
  • Wyoming

States with all schools connected to high-speed fiber:

  • Hawaii
  • Delaware
  • Kentucky
  • Tennessee
  • West Virginia

States with highest percentage of school districts that have affordable broadband:

  • Hawaii
  • Connecticut
  • Delaware
  • Maine
  • South Dakota

States that are most improved in percent of school districts now meeting the minimum connectivity goal (from 2015 to 2016):

  • North Carolina
  • Delaware
  • Tennessee
  • Nevada
  • Virginia

States that upgraded the most students in 2016:

  • North Carolina
  • Tennessee
  • Virginia
  • New Mexico
  • Arkansas

States that are most improved in school broadband affordability (from 2015 to 2016):

  • South Dakota
  • Nevada
  • Rhode Island
  • Nebraska
  • Delaware

In a statement, Evan Marwell, founder and CEO of EducationSuperHighway said, “It is clear: States are making tremendous progress in getting more and more students online at the speeds necessary to take advantage of digital learning. During the past year, an additional 10.4 million students gained the minimum connectivity they need, and 88 percent of school districts nationally are now meeting minimum connectivity goals.”

The full “2016 State of the States” report can be found on EducationSuperHighway’s website.

About the Author

Richard Chang is associate editor of THE Journal. He can be reached at [email protected].

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