Alachua County schools to use $6M in pandemic relief for at-home internet expansion

The Alachua County School District will use federal pandemic relief funding to help students have better access to the internet at home.

Alachua County Public Schools on Tuesday announced its efforts to bridge the digital divide with money from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), which could potentially provide enough funding to give thousands of students take-home laptops with built-in internet connections or hotspots.

The Emergency Connectivity Fund (ECF) Program was approved by Congress as part of the rescue plan passed in 2021.

The school district is set to use about $6 million for the upcoming year, said district spokeswoman Jackie Johnson, who added subsequent efforts in Congress could help pay for continued access in the following years.

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At the House level, the bill passed 220-211, with every Republican and one Democrat voting against it before being signed into law by President Joe Biden. Likewise, it previously and narrowly was approved in the Senate along party lines with a 50-49 vote.

The school district will send students home with a hard copy of a short survey with questions for parents to answer about their child's access to the internet and device. The survey also can be completed online at www.sbac.edu/techsurvey, and also will be available via text and email.

All responses will be confidential, district officials said. The deadline to complete the survey is May 13 with the hope that devices will be ready for distribution by the start of next school year. The federal government will pay the vendors directly, Johnson said.

“We particularly need to hear from the families of students who don’t have access to the internet at home, either because they lack a device, connectivity, or both,” Johnson said in a news release. “That could include families that don’t have enough technology resources for all the students in their household.”

This article originally appeared on The Gainesville Sun: Alachua schools set to receive $6M in covid relief for at-home internet