{"id":33460,"date":"2021-07-22T01:25:08","date_gmt":"2021-07-22T01:25:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/e-ratepaorg.local\/?p=33460"},"modified":"2021-08-02T18:22:58","modified_gmt":"2021-08-02T18:22:58","slug":"fcc-expands-ways-to-determine-unmet-needs-for-ecf","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/?p=33460","title":{"rendered":"FCC Expands Ways to Determine Unmet Needs for ECF"},"content":{"rendered":"

July 22, 2021<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, the FCC provided several very positive clarifications\/changes related to the Emergency Connectivity Fund (ECF).\u00a0 They are:<\/p>\n

1. Expansion of Ways to Determine Unmet Needs:<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0To determine \u201cunmet need\u201d for the Form 471 application, the FCC has clarified that applicants are not required to rely on student\/family surveys and may also consider publicly available information, including but not limited to free and reduced lunch participation, census data, and broadband maps.\u00a0 This is a wonderful development and hopefully will encourage more schools and libraries to apply.\u00a0 Note that applicants, however, should be able to demonstrate proof of unmet need of the students\/teachers\/library patrons at the ECF\u00a0reimbursement<\/em>\u00a0stage.\u00a0 To do this, I strongly recommend that schools obtain a signed statement of need, either online or on paper, when the devices are distributed (libraries already have this requirement).<\/p>\n

Links to Publicly Available Data<\/em>:<\/strong>\u00a0 Below are links to the 2019 NSLP Participation for PA schools and U.S. Census data.\u00a0 (Note:\u00a0 The census data shows the percentage of households that lack internet and\/or computers entirely, so these percentages are likely much lower than your actual unmet need which is defined as students that lack access to a computer (one per student) and\/or Internet access that is sufficient to participate in two-way online learning while off campus.\u00a0 The data also is not specific to households with K-12 students.)\u00a0 The data was downloaded from the\u00a0NTIA<\/a>\u00a0website, filtered for PA, and uploaded to the\u00a0www.e-ratepa.org<\/a>\u00a0website under the ECF tab.\u00a0 Here are the direct links:<\/p>\n

>\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a02019 NSLP Eligibility for PA Schools<\/a>\u00a0(the last year that NSLP participation was based on poverty)<\/p>\n

>\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Census Broadband & Device Needs Data by School District<\/a><\/p>\n

>\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Census Broadband & Device Needs Data by County<\/a><\/p>\n

>\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0Census Broadband & Device Needs Data by Census Tract<\/a><\/p>\n

2. Invoice Deadline for Equipment Extended:<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0The invoice deadline for\u00a0equipment and other non-recurring services funding requests\u00a0has been changed to 60 days from the last date to receive equipment.\u00a0 Because the last date to receive equipment for ECF Window 1 will generally be June 30, 2022, the invoicing deadline for both recurring and non-recurring FRNs will now be August 29, 2022.\u00a0 I strongly encourage all applicants to\u00a0not\u00a0modify the 7\/1\/2021 \u2013 6\/30\/2022 dates on the ECF Form 471.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 If you list an earlier Service End Date, the system will then give you only 60 days from that date to submit a reimbursement form.<\/p>\n

3. Clarification of Ordering Date Rules:<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0The ECF rules contained confusing language related to when applicants must place orders for ECF eligible equipment\/services so the FCC clarified that applicants are not required to actually have orders placed at the time they submit their Form 471.<\/p>\n

If you have any questions about these clarifications or ECF, please let me know!<\/p>\n

— Julie<\/p>\n

Julie Tritt Schell
\nPennsylvania E-rate Coordinator
\n717-730-7133 – o
\njtschell@comcast.net<\/a>
\nwww.e-ratepa.org<\/a><\/p>\n\n

Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

July 22, 2021<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33460","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-listserve_archive"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33460","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33460"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33460\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33460"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33460"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/e-ratepa.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33460"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}