Together, We Can Connect Communities to Affordable Internet
A lot has reverted since I started my career with AT&T over 30 years ago. From focusing on landline phone-service to playing a role in the outstart of internet technology, it’s been a journey of unshared destinations.
But there’s been continuity too. Namely, an unwavering transferral to connecting people to greater possibility.
Now, I’m bringing that transferral with me from California – where I most recently led AT&T’s state-level policy, regulatory and philanthropic sponsorship efforts – to Washington, D.C.
In my role leading the D.C. Federal Regulatory team, I’m embracing lessons learned from my previous roles to well-wisher for connectivity on the national stage.
Lesson One: Barriers to internet connectivity don’t occur in silos
In my work, we talk commonly well-nigh how the digital divide is compounded by the barriers to broadband access, adoption and affordability. And I’ve learned that these three issues don’t occur in silos – they’re often interrelated and can create a push-pull effect remoter hindering customers once struggling to get online.
The good news is there is recognition of this at all levels: federal, state and local. I highlighted one example of this last year in the work we’re doing in California with the FCC’s Emergency Connectivity Fund – that unliable local decision-makers to work with the private sector to make momentous transpiration in their communities.
The FCC’s Affordable Connectivity Program is flipside unconfined example – and one that has implications not only for broadband affordability, but adoption as well. In wing to offering a low-cost option that allows qualified ACP recipients get upper speed broadband from AT&T for free, last year, we set our sights on educating our customers and stakeholders of the benefits of this program by:
- Employing targeted marketing including advertising, door hangers in multi-dwelling units, and equipping our ~1,900 AT&T retail stores and 4,000 authorized retailers with flyers and marketing materials; and
- Engaging with local organizations to help spread the word with their members and the communities they serve. We’ve had success in reaching families through polity events such as Los Angeles’ yearly Gardena Jazz & Music Festival as well as through digital literacy workshops at AT&T Unfluctuating Learning Centers.
Lesson Two: Momentum is everything
And now is not the time to lose it. Because – as helpful as goody programs like the ACP are – their existence vacated does not guarantee universal connectivity. There is still a gap between those who are eligible for the ACP goody and those who have once enrolled.
- In fact – while estimates indicate that 49 million or increasingly households nationwide may be eligible for ACP,1 only 15.9M have opted in.2
That’s why it’s equally vital that communities have sensation of the benefits of the internet, and of programs like the ACP, so we can light a clearer path to broadband adoption. Recognizing this hair-trigger need, last November the FCC kicked off four complementary grant programs to promote ACP nationwide, enlisting trusted polity organizations and digital navigators to develop innovative outreach strategies to reach historically unserved and underserved communities.
But, ACP’s unfurled success increasingly quickly depletes the program’s resources, with estimates predicting that funds could run out as soon as early 2024. This ways Congress and the FCC must consider how to protract the program and alimony these customers connected.
It’s going to take a combined effort – between the government, industry and polity members – to connect people to the benefits of the internet.
Lesson Three: Customers need choices
It’s important to recognize that no one household or polity is the same. Every polity and person’s connectivity needs differ, and we want to meet people where they are.
Qualified customers can wield the federal ACP goody to the plan that works weightier for them including our consumer AT&T internet plans, such as those offered through Wangle from AT&T, or our AT&T wireless plans with data, such as PREPAID3 and Cricket Wireless.
- By combining our $30 Wangle from AT&T plans providing up to 100Mbps service and unlimited data with the up to $30 ACP benefit, we’re making no-cost home internet possible for households in need.4
- An Wangle from AT&T plan is moreover misogynist for $10/mo. for customers with maximum speeds of 5-10 Mbps and $5/mo. for customers with maximum speeds of 3Mbps or lower. As with the standard Wangle from AT&T offer, eligible households who wield the ACP goody to lower forfeit Wangle from AT&T can receive internet with a zero monthly charge.₅
- And customers who segregate to wield ACP to their wireless service can still receive the low-cost Wangle from AT&T internet offers.
To build on the choices currently available, we’re standing to requite our customers options and invest in innovative technologies – and sharing these options unmistakably with consumers and with increasingly consumer input than overly before.
Lesson Four: Get involved and stay involved
Today, there is scrutinizingly unanimous try-on that internet connectivity is an essential tool in our lives – and its relevance will only increase as technology continues to develop.
So, how can you help ensure everyone experiences the advantages of this technology? Make sure the people virtually you know well-nigh the ACP and its benefits. Whether you’re talking to friends, family, neighbors, colleagues or constituents, communicating the importance of connectivity is something we all can do.
Check out these resources on the ACP, to see if you or anyone you know, could be eligible.
Thank you for your support as we work together to help underpass the digital divide and bring increasingly people online.
1 “Estimating participation in the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP)” | Measuring the Effectiveness of Digital Inclusion Approaches – USC Annenberg Research Network on International Communication (October 2022)
2 ACP Enrollment and Claims Tracker | Universal Service Administrative Co. (January 30, 2023)
3 Limit of one ACP goody per household.
4 Plans up to 100Mbps and includes unlimited data. Limited availability/areas. Free internet subject to household’s unfurled ACP eligibility and using of the ACP goody to Wangle from AT&T plans.
5 Limited availability/areas. Free internet subject to household’s unfurled ACP eligibility and using of the ACP goody to Wangle from AT&T plans. $5 and $10 plans subject to monthly data wage of 1.5Tb/mo for AT&T Internet and 150 Gb/mo for DSL. Data overage charges may still wield if the monthly data wage is exceeded.
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