FCC awards $41M for schools and libraries

WASHINGTON – The Federal Communications Commission today announced it is committing over $40.8 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. Today's funding commitment supports applications from the third application window, benefitting approximately 110,000 students nationwide, including students in Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Utah, and Washington.

Today’s announcement will support approximately 220 schools and school districts, 7 libraries and library systems, and 3 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. More details about which schools and libraries have received funding commitments can be found at https://www.fcc.gov/emergency-connectivity-fund.

Launched in 2021, the Emergency Connectivity Fund Program has provided schools and libraries three different "application windows" to apply for support. Approximately $6.99 billion in funding commitments have been approved to date, approximately $4.14 billion is supporting applications from Window 1; $834 million from Window 2; and $2.02 billion from Window 3. To date, the funding has provided support to over 18 million students, 11,300 schools, 1,060 libraries, and 120 consortia, and provided nearly 13 million connected devices and over 8 million broadband connections.

As a long-term solution to the Homework Gap, Chairwoman Rosenworcel recently announced her new initiative "Learn Without Limits" to modernize the E-Rate program to allow for Wi-Fi on school buses and for permanent support to loan out Wi-Fi hotspots.

Read the full press release here.
FCC