This Fast Company article cites to a California study may suggest that the socio-economic divide may be destined to continue its historic growth unless there is fundamental change in family culture.
Maybe Bill Cosby was right. If so the challenge for society is to figure out how to encourage the change.
A couple things… Kris and I were down in El Paso today talking with people who know a lot about these things in the region…and there are ways and means and potentials for needed change.
Would especially help if someone can invent a low cost high bandwidth solution for rural and poor areas…and use that in conjunction with a “immersion in community” type program that enlists needed support for learning from families and the people there.
Yes, there are still going to be some significant limitations because of the “starting point” of “poor kids”…OTOH, lot of room for dramatic improvement too.
One study does not a reliable foundation for action make re usefulness of cloud tools for poor kids. There are other studies out there with different results when poor students have new access to communication tools.
Speaking of perspectives on social and economic divides, and in CA, my brother in law had joined my sister at one of the inventive schools for the “industry” elite in S.Cal…and has now left and gone back to working with “inner city” LA school kids (if there was an “inner city” in LA…) back in the plain old school system. POSS. And thus seeing things “from both sides now”.
I’ve looked at “clouds” from both sides now, and still somehow etc etc.
Low cost communications in rural areas is only possible via subsidy. The inherent costs, whether wired or wireless, increase as density decreases. It is exactly like with electrical service and basic telephone service.
The question will be who funds, how much and to whom. My trip to northern NM reminded me of the challenges. It is one thing to build a “middle-mile” network to tie rural communities together (still hundreds of millions), quite another to reach truly off-the-grid end users.
At a bare minimum, “affordable” universal access will require some quite limited bandwidth access if the cost is to be born by the society rather than the end-user.
Satellite is likely the “best answer” for the truly remote, but it ain’t cheap (per GB).
The best model going regionally, at the moment, AFAIK…seems to be wire the schools, and then get the parents and kids to the schools to “jack in” there. What Kris and I heard yesterday is that schools are still resisting being “community computing centers” because of…well, they say security issues.
However also learned yesterday that, for example, schools in Gadsden District, and maybe other regional school districts do too….have something called the “parent house” where parents come for various school related functions….and sometimes for computer based learning.
Pie in the sky, or low cost satellite in the sky at low altitude…helium/drone I dunno what…some new tech invention that makes broadband available in rural areas. There’s a big market, world wide… poor people mostly, but they are already cell phone customers of some kind…and aggregated maybe somehow the costs::ROI works.
Something for Elton Musk to provide a big prize and have a contest. Or one of the bazillionaire hedge fund managers who wants to make amends.