Broadband’s ability to expand educational and employment opportunities is especially meaningful for Americans who are deaf or hard of hearing, a community that faces unique challenges in education and that suffers from a rate of unemployment much higher than the national average. Communication Service for the Deaf, Inc. (CSD) intends to expand broadband adoption among people who are deaf and hard of hearing and provide them with online tools to more fully participate in the digital economy. The project proposes to employ a combination of discounted broadband service and specialized computers, technology training from an online state-of-the art support center customized to the community’s needs, public access to videophones at anchor institutions from coast to coast, and a nationwide outreach initiative. Thousands will gain online access to all the Internet has to offer, including sign language interpreters, captioned video services, and other content and functionalities designed especially to advance their educational, employment, and healthcare interests.

State Capacity Building:

The Florida Department of Management Services (DMS) will establish a broadband programs office to lead collaborative efforts in broadband capacity building across local, regional, and state public and private institutions. The broadband programs office will include a grant development team and an E-rate program team. The E-rate team will provide direct support to eligible community anchor institutions so that Florida can best leverage available funding opportunities. The grant development team will provide technical assistance to organizations across the state that are seeking to increase broadband access and adoption in their communities.

Technical Assistance:

The Library Connectivity Assessment project will deploy technology teams to provide a hardware and network assessment to 180 Florida public libraries in rural and underserved communities. A similar pilot program led to a number of simple network configuration solutions that, when implemented, improved the speed of the community anchor institutions’ broadband service. The technology team will also work with each library to provide recommendations for addressing larger, systematic problems.

Local Regional Technology Planning Teams:

In partnership with Florida’s 11 Regional Planning Councils (RPCs), DMS will develop and sustain regional planning teams that will be integrated into the current work of the RPCs. The RPCs will inventory and document local broadband assets, document broadband demand through an inclusive process that draws residents and institutional actors, and develop a comprehensive regional plan.

Data Collection, Integration, and Validation:

This project was originally funded for broadband planning activities and two years of data collection. In September of 2010, this project was amended to extend data collection activities for an additional three years and to identify and implement best practices.

The Expanding Broadband Access Across Florida project proposes to build seven new access points on Level 3’s existing broadband network to enable last mile providers to offer affordable high-speed services to underserved areas. The additional points of interconnection will offer broadband speeds between 50 Mbps and 10 Gbps on an open and nondiscriminatory basis to last mile Internet service providers. Similar to on-ramps to the interstate highway system, these points of interconnection will enable last mile providers to transport data to the Internet backbone and provide affordable service to anchor institutions, homes, and businesses. The project could enhance broadband capabilities for as many as 180,000 households, 12,300 businesses, and 100 community anchor institutions, including schools, government agencies, and healthcare providers.

The Connect Your Community (CYC) project intends to use an innovative and collaborative strategy to expand broadband adoption by almost 20,000 households in targeted communities in five states. Expanding on successful existing Cleveland-area programs, OneCommunity plans to work with non-profit and community organizations to implement neighbor-to-neighbor broadband adoption and awareness campaigns reaching 334,000 low-income individuals and to provide training and services to 33,000 people in Akron, Cleveland, and Zanesville, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; Gulfport/Biloxi, Mississippi; Lexington, Kentucky; and Bradenton, Florida. Grant funds will enable project partners, including Urban League centers, libraries, schools, economic development agencies, and human service and housing organizations, to host computer classes and utilize online resources to fulfill their missions. The project plans to employ survey techniques to measure broadband adoption among program participants and track the program’s success over time.

The Miami-Dade County Public Schools-Get Connected-Go Global project proposes to increase broadband adoption among low-income middle school students and their families by providing training, discounted computers, Internet service, and awareness campaigns targeting vulnerable communities. Miami-Dade County recently introduced a student/parent portal to enable parents to monitor their children’s academic progress and communicate more easily with their teachers and schools. To ensure all families can utilize the tool, in 35 schools with the highest need, the project plans to offer 60,000 hours of computer training to 30,000 students and their parents, provide low-cost refurbished laptops to 6,000 students and their families, and offer discounted Internet service to 10,000 families. A county-wide, bilingual print, broadcast, and online campaign intends to reach 700,000 residents and build awareness of the educational, job, and health benefits of being connected to broadband technology. The project expects to increase broadband adoption by an estimated 15,000 households, and plans to track adoption rates over time using focus groups, a teacher-parent online portal, surveys, and feedback from broadband providers.