Best Buy on board with Obama initiative

Under the auspices of ensuring digital opportunity for all Americans, Best Buy has aligned itself with President Barack Obama and several service providers on wide-ranging initiative to improve high speed Internet access.

The program, called ConnectHome, was unveiled by the president on July 15 during a visit to Durant, Okla., and involves 275,000 households with nearly 200,000 children in 27 cities.

According to a statement by the White House, Best Buy will offer residents of Housing and Urban Development housing in select ConnectHome demonstration project cities, including Choctaw Tribal Nation, the computer training and technical support needed to maximize the academic and economic impact of broadband access. Best Buy will also offer afterschool technical training, for free, to students participating in ConnectHome at Best Buy Teen Centers in Atlanta, Los Angeles, New York City, San Antonio, and Washington, DC.

Other cities included in the ConnectHome pilot program include Albany, GA; Baltimore, Baton Rouge, Boston, Camden, NJ; Cleveland, Denver, Durham, NC; Fresno, CA; Kansas City, MO; Little Rock, AR; Macon, GA; Memphis, Meriden, CT; Nashville, New Orleans, Newark, Philadelphia, Rockford, IL; San Antonio, Seattle, Springfield, MA; and Tampa.

ConnectHome is the next step in the President’s efforts to expand high speed broadband to all Americans and build on a previously announced initiative called ConnectED. That program is on track to connect 99% of K-12 students to high-speed Internet in their classrooms and libraries over the next five years, according to the White House.

Despite accessibility at schools, the President contends that a digital divide exists because lower income children don’t have high speed access at home. While nearly two-thirds of households in the lowest-income quintile own a computer, less than half have a home internet subscription. Beside not being able to shop online, what that means according to the White House is that many middle-class students go home to Internet access, allowing them to do research, write papers, and communicate digitally with their teachers and other students. However, too many other lower-income children go unplugged every afternoon when school ends, thus creating a “homework gap” which runs the risk of widening the achievement gap, thereby denying hardworking students the benefit of a technology-enriched education.