Each February 15, updated statistics on Internet access in K-12 classrooms are released by the National Center for Educational Statistics. The projections included in the Table in the main body of this column were made before the release of data compiled from Fall 1999 survey results. Those data, released in February 2000 (see http://nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid=2000086), show that in Fall 1999, 63 percent of classrooms in the United States had at least one Internet-connected computer. Based on this one-year interval increase of 12 percent from 1998, I project that 75 percent of U.S. classrooms will be Internet connected by Fall 2000. If this pattern holds, Internet access will be available in 99 percent of classrooms by 2002. This may well be conservative, however. In 1998, the e-rate subsidy program that provides discounted telecommunications services for schools and libraries was stalled as a result of Congressional mandates to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to halt funding until a more adequate accounting process was in place. Now that this situation has been resolved, the percentage of Internet-connected classrooms in the U.S. may reach 100 before Fall 2002.

Though they do show growth in the rate of classroom Internet connections, the data released in February 2000 raise a disturbing issue -- equity of Internet access between richer and poorer schools. The figure below shows the percentage of classrooms with Internet access according to the percentage of free and reduced lunches provided in a school. It reveals that richer schools had two to three times as many classrooms with Internet access in 1994 and 1996, until the e-rate subsidy program was initiated. It also shows that this gap began to narrow in 1998 with the initiation of the e-rate subsidy, only to widen again in 1999 when the e-rate subsidy was interrupted. One hopes that with the restart of the e-rate program, this gap will again begin to narrow.

Of course, access does not mean effective use of the Internet to support teaching and learning. That is another issue entirely -- one that is critical to our children's future. What does appear clear is that, in the United States, richer schools will have greater Internet access unless federal support continues for poorer schools.

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