In an opinion piece for Broadband Breakfast, IST Senior VP for Policy Nicholas Leiserson and Senior Director for Preparedness and Response Michael Klein make the case for expanding the Federal Communications Commission’s E-Rate program to bolster the cybersecurity resilience of K-12 schools. As it stands, the E-Rate program uses monies from the Universal Service Fund to help schools and libraries afford broadband internet.
“When cyber criminals strike, they can have real impacts on our children and their education…When schools shut down due to unavailability of their information systems, learning suffers—as does the delivery of other social services like nutrition programs that are integrated into the education system. When Congress passed E-Rate nearly 30 years ago, they could not have intended that Internet access enabled through universal service funds would end up denying students an education,” the authors write.
