Digital Skills Training

By: Maci Morin and Michell Morton, Office of Internet Connectivity and Growth

In today's digital world, access to technology and the Internet enables boundless opportunities.  Now more than ever, women and girls are seizing these opportunities to smash barriers and soar to new heights. 

For women and girls, achieving digital equity is more than gaining access to the devices and connectivity that empower them – it is also about safeguarding their journey. 

Robert Davis, 28, was working in construction but looking for a new career that would still provide the outdoor work he craved.

By Angela Thi Bennett, Director of Digital Equity, NTIA

Today, all 50 States, D.C., and Puerto Rico have submitted their Digital Equity Plans to NTIA for acceptance. This is a milestone moment in closing the digital divide. For the first time in our nation’s history, each state will have a plan to connect communities with the resources they need to achieve digital equity. That’s never been true before, and it’s an exciting indicator of how far we’ve come as a nation in acknowledging and addressing this challenge. 

The Connecting Minority Communities Pilot (CMC) Program is a $268 million grant program to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs), and Minority-Serving Institutions (MSIs) for the purchase of broadband internet access service and eligible equipment or to hire and train information technology personnel.

Every time you access your email, join a video conference call or back up the photos on your smartphone, you rely on cloud computing. The cloud delivers computing resources over the Internet, such as storage, software, and services, creating a complex supply chain requiring extensive security protocols. This webinar will provide an overview of cloud service adoption and make you aware of the security and privacy challenges pertinent to public cloud computing.

Libraries and schools often form partnerships to creatively address their local “homework gap,” or barriers that some students face to complete online schoolwork without reliable access to high-speed internet. This webinar will feature real world examples of how these community anchor institutions work together to provide students with access to hotspots and devices. It will also cover how they are empowering students with the knowledge and skills needed to complete online assignments, as well as the utilize the wealth of information and educational resources available on the internet.

By Margaret Harding McGill, NTIA

Phashad Williams is taking the first steps toward putting a new spin on his grandfather’s legacy.

Williams’ grandfather Harold Cottrell was the first Black line supervisor for an electric company in Oklahoma and was also one of the first Black Journeyman in the state.

The NTIA Office of Minority Broadband Initiatives (OMBI) plays an important role in the Internet For All initiative by promoting equitable high-speed Internet access and adoption at Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs), Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), and in their surrounding anchor communities. OMBI’s guiding vision is to achieve digital equity for minority communities across the United States.
 

Please join the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) for the last of four virtual listening session on the Digital Equity Act Request for Comment. These listening sessions are designed to collect stakeholder input to help inform the development and administration of the State Digital Equity Capacity and State Digital Equity Competitive grant programs. The focus of this listening session will be the State Digital Equity Competitive grant program.

Auto-captioning will be provided during this listening session.