policy@edu
Increasing Broadband
Access
As the
Internet becomes more prevalent in American society and as our industry
and political leaders debate the best way to enable all Americans to
take advantage of speedier and more reliable Internet service, the term
broadband has worked its way into the technologist's vernacular.
Broadband is currently defined as the technical capacity to transfer
data at a rate of 200 kilobits per second in one direction. Kilobits
aside, broadband allows Internet users full-time access to the Internet
and the ability to run quality, high-speed applications (such as video)--services
that the current "dial-up" Internet cannot match.
As with most products
in a market economy, the driving factor behind the deployment of broadband
is financial profit. Broadband providers tend to offer their services
where a suitable infrastructure and customer concentration already exist.
As a result, universities and colleges without an existing infrastructure
and those located in remote, rural areas are finding it a challenge
to obtain affordable broadband connections for faculty and students.
Expanding broadband
deployment will improve the capacity of higher education institutions
to provide quality education for learners anywhere, anytime. Broadband
enables much more effective distance education by allowing students
and teachers located in different parts of the world to communicate
and interact on a "real time" basis, as though they were in the same
physical classroom, and by enabling students to select course offerings
from institutions outside their physical proximity. Access to broadband
technology will provide remote students, like students residing on campus,
with the ability to utilize data-intensive information resources.
Is Government
Intervention Necessary for Increased Broadband Access?
Fearing a lack of
return on investment, incumbent carriers such as the regional Bell operating
companies have been slow in rolling out broadband services to rural
areas, and the Federal Communications Commission has been reluctant
to intervene. This past July the FCC credited its laissez-faire policy
decisions over the past thirty years with "creating a deregulatory environment
in which the Internet could flourish."1 This followed an FCC report,
released last January, which concluded that "broadband is being deployed
in a reasonable and timely fashion" and which added that the FCC saw
no reason for agency activism.
Many members of
Congress do not appear to share the FCC's optimism. A growing number
believe that the telecommunications industry has been hampered in the
rollout of broadband by "burdensome" regulations imposed in the Telecommunications
Act of 1996. Others feel that certain segments of the industry need
positive regulatory incentives to spur broadband deployment. In contrast
to the FCC's hands-off approach, at the time of this writing four activist
broadband bills are pending in Congress, three of them offered by congressional
members representing constituents living in rural areas. Approaches
in these bills include the following:
- Requiring incumbent
local exchange carriers to provide a business plan to the proper state
commission explaining how they will provide broadband services to
all local exchange areas
- Eliminating the
authority of the FCC to determine pricing or technical standards
- For data communications,
removing the inter-local access and transport area (inter-LATA) restrictions
imposed on incumbent telecom carriers by the Telecom Act of 1996
Although it is unlikely
that any of the bills will reach their respective floors this session,
Congress has demonstrated its impatience with the Telecom Act and with
the slow deployment of broadband. This promises to remain a hot issue
for some time to come.
Approaches
of the Higher Education Community
The higher education
community has differed in its approaches to providing high-speed Internet
connectivity. Some institutions are partnering with local broadband
providers to secure discounts for broadband services and are even sharing
their access with the surrounding community. The University of Florida
at Gainesville, for example, is partnering with a local provider to
create a program whereby off-campus students and anyone else in the
Gainesville area can obtain high-speed Internet access via cable modems.
Other states have
taken a direct approach and have funded the development of state networks
whose mission often includes reaching remote or rural educational institutions
and communities. For example, the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority established
a partnership with the University of Massachusetts to extend connectivity
by expanding the Internet backbone beyond the university campus via
regional consortiums.
Many of these state-oriented
networks were initially funded through the National Science Foundation's
Connections program. The Arkansas ARKnet began with initial NSF funding
in 1991, with twenty-one institutions participating. Eight years later,
ARKnet's membership now includes all of the state's universities, colleges,
and community colleges. Working with two other state networks--the Arkansas
Department of Information Systems and the Arkansas Public School Computer
Network--ARKnet is helping to provide direct Internet access throughout
the state.
Today, over thirty-six
states have what can be classified as state public sector or education
networks.2 Perhaps the community-based approach employed
by these states, with help from their local higher education institutions,
can serve as a lesson as Congress debates how to cajole the telecommunications
industry into deploying broadband into underserved residential areas.
Endnotes
1. The FCC report
(Working Paper #31) can be found at http://www.fcc.gov/broadband/
2. See Net@EDU's
State Public Networks Table at http://www.educause.edu/netatedu/contents/reports/
Note: EDUCAUSE,
through the Net@EDU Network
Extension Program, is working with the higher education community
to find viable solutions for improving Internet connectivity.
Garret Sern,
EDUCAUSE Policy Staff
