Connectivity counts: MaineCF works with partners across counties
to bridge a broadband gap
How well are you connected?
In a small state like Maine, odds are you won’t go far before you see a familiar face. But connectivity – our ability to reach the world through high-speed internet – still lags behind the rest of the country. About 30% of Mainers subscribe to basic broadband service compared to 53% nationally, and 11% subscribe to high-speed broadband, compared to 44% nationally.*
MaineCF is helping to bridge the broadband gap through collaboration with partners, public policy advocacy, and our new Community Broadband Grant Program. Funding to nonprofit Our Katahdin will provide staff support for a new broadband utility for Millinocket, East Millinocket, and Medway. Biddeford is working on a broadband plan that will serve a specific low-income neighborhood. In Franklin County, 22 towns are developing a countywide plan to serve some of the most rural places in the state.
Connectivity emerged as an important issue during MaineCF’s community conversations across the state in 2016. “What started as a conversation about how entrepreneurs need high-speed internet access to reach customers, markets, and other resources to grow and be successful turned into the realization that it’s a quality of life issue for everyone in our communities,” says Maggie Drummond-Bahl, senior program officer who oversees MaineCF’s broadband initiative.
Digital inclusion benefits older people who want to access services such as telemedicine, work remotely, or connect socially online. It helps students who need access to educational resources and online services. And it bolsters communities that want to attract remote workers to support their schools and businesses and stem outward migration.
But Maine needs much more than infrastructure to compete on the global stage. The Maine Digital Inclusion Initiative, the first statewide program in the nation, is providing free digital literacy classes with a focus on workplace development and aging in place. It aims to educate 30,000 people by 2021 through classes taught by AmeriCorps digital literacy instructors. MaineCF is supporting the three-year effort with grants that total $150,000.
Susan Corbett, program manager of the initiative, says most adults over 40 have learned technology on a need-to-know basis. Building on those skills can open doors to more education or better jobs.
For older adults, the new technology skills can be life changing: “If you can keep people in their homes longer and safer and provide a way for family and caregivers to connect to them” says Corbett, “maybe they will be able to stay in a place they love for a longer period of time.”
Corbett says the fear factor in digital literacy classes is put to rest quickly when students realize they’re in the same place as everyone else. And when they all reach the “I didn’t know I could do this stage,” she says, “that’s where the reward comes in: ‘I didn’t know I could and now I can.’”
*Measures of Growth 2019/Maine Economic Growth Council
Photo: Older students learn how cloud-based software works during an introduction to computers class at the Old Town library. Photo Ashley L. Conti
