Archive for October, 2012

Lisa Maxwell remembers when pencils, textbooks and a calculator were just about the only requisites students needed to get homework done. But Maxwell, who is Executive Director of the non-profit Boys and Girls Clubs of Central Oregon (BGCCO), says success in and outside the classroom now depends on a new tool of student achievement: broadband Internet access.

In the “Lower 48,” the buzz about broadband usually revolves around speed: how many data megabits per second (Mbps) rocket up and down the network. In Alaska, broadband data rates are important, but there’s another performance indicator that’s getting lots of attention.

As of April 2012, 66 percent of U.S. adults had Internet access from home via a high-speed broadband connection, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

A 2011 survey of manufacturing companies in Northwest Minnesota turned up a startling finding: 25 percent of available jobs were left unfilled because of a shortage of skilled workers, particularly in the fields of science, engineering and production.

In western and central Kansas, the cable company Eagle Communications has built broadband networks in agricultural communities as small as Bird City (population 446) and Milford (545).

For low-income families that want to join the Internet revolution, two big impediments often stand in the way: the cost of a modern computer, and the cost of high-speed Internet access that enables connectivity to a modern, digitally powered world.

For the national political conventions this year, cable was heavily involved with the telecommunications systems. Cable operators provided critical infrastructure for convention-goers to communicate with each other, and for political parties to communicate with the world.

With the proliferation of digital and online communications, the rise of social networking, and the creation of a digital footprint for each of us – the urgent need for secure data solutions has spread from the highest levels of government, through all of our public and private networks, into our very homes…and anywhere else we use data.