K-12 Bridge to Broadband Partner Program

How It Works

By committing to a set of principles, NTCA member broadband providers can express their interest in partnerships with local school systems, who will take on bulk procurement of home Internet access for those students living in homes that do not already purchase such services. These principles include:

Creating a “sponsored” service offering. You choose the service and the price, which will then be considered in Requests for Proposal issued by local school districts.
Helping school districts identify which students need service. School districts will identify addresses where students indicate they cannot participate in remote learning, and broadband providers will indicate in turn whether they can initiate service quickly at any of those locations.
Agreeing with the school district to a baseline set of eligibility standards for the sponsored service offering. For example, it may be that the school district is interested in procurement of broadband service for every enrolled student in the free or reduced school lunch program that does not already subscribe to broadband.
Agreeing not to market to families in the sponsored service program in exchange for the school district procuring services on behalf of those families.
Minimizing the amount of information families must provide at sign-up in order to maximize adoption.
Creating a transition upon termination of the sponsored service program.

Review our principles for Solving the Home Connectivity Gap for more specific guidelines.

Why Join?

There is no “one size fits all” solution to ensuring every student is connected. But we believe local solutions start by having local schools and broadband providers talk with each other. Here is why that’s important:

Broadband “Access” Is Not a Singular Problem

Sometimes, when we hear about students not having “access” to broadband at home, access means a house has no connection at all—the customer literally cannot order a fixed broadband connection to that location. In other cases, access means a house actually has a connection, but the family is not subscribing to service. In both cases, the ability of rural school systems and families to bridge digital gaps for this future generation is hindered.

NTCA Members Have a Unique Opportunity to Help

As “hometown providers,” NTCA members have gone above and beyond to help their families, friends, and neighbors during the pandemic, and they have connected even more people by, for example, setting up drive-in wi-fi hot spots, “broadband in a box” services to support socially distanced installs, and donating Chromebooks to students. As providers who often live and raise families in the areas they serve, NTCA members have a unique opportunity to lead rural communities in solving this issue by offering solutions to schools in their own backyards.

JOIN THE PROGRAM