Connect South Carolina Releases 2011 Residential Broadband Adoption Survey Results

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43% of South Carolina residents still do not adopt broadband at home

Columbia, South Carolina – Today, Connect South Carolina released new residential broadband adoption survey results revealing the top trends in technology use among key demographics in South Carolina. The preliminary indicators from the survey are available online, which gives a comprehensive view of the challenges and opportunities for expanding broadband in targeted sectors. Approximately 43% of South Carolina residents are not subscribing to broadband at home. Most notably, the majority of low-income, rural, senior, disabled adult, Hispanic, and African-American households are without broadband at home, leaving them facing an uphill battle in keeping up with essential online resources, job and educational opportunities, and social services.

This survey is conducted in support of Connect South Carolina’s efforts to close South Carolina’s digital gap. The survey explores the main barriers to adoption – cost, digital skills, and relevance – and also provides unique insights into the national broadband landscape.

“The broadband adoption gap affects us all – it affects the economic future of our communities, it affects the education of our children, and it affects the economy’s potential for job growth,” said Tom Koutsky, chief policy counsel for Connected Nation, Connect South Carolina’s parent organization. “But there are no simple solutions to what is a multifaceted problem. Our South Carolina-based research into the demographic, economic, and digital skill barriers to adoption is a crucial first step that will help communities and policymakers tailor and target effective broadband adoption solutions.”

This survey reveals that:

• 53% percent of people living in rural areas do not subscribe to broadband service at home.
• When comparing to the 57% of all households that do subscribe, there remain large gaps among key demographics:
       o 74% of low-income households;
       o 51% of Hispanic households; and
       o 69% of seniors are without broadband.
• Approximately 170,000 children in low-income households are without access to this essential tool at home.
• 252,000 South Carolina adults say a lack of digital skills and knowledge of how to use a computer and broadband is the main reason they don’t have broadband at home.
• The biggest gap is among low-income seniors. Only 9% of low-income seniors subscribe to broadband and only 24% have a computer at home.

These results and comparisons to many others are available on Connect South Carolina’s new consumer trends widget. This interactive tool gives people the ability to view, share, and download the results. Connect South Carolina will use these survey results to target solutions in communities based on the demographic and economic barriers that the surveys indicate are most relevant to those communities.

This release comes on the heels of the FCC’s newly released plans to launch a comprehensive public-private initiative called Connect to Compete, aimed at extending digital literacy training and providing employment assistance to communities. Connect South Carolina’s parent organization, Connected Nation, is one of the top strategic advisors in the national initiative.

Connect South Carolina’s 2011 residential survey was conducted in the summer of 2011 and includes responses from 3,601 residents. The survey was conducted as part of the South Carolina Broadband Initiative (SBI) grant program, funded by the U.S. Department of Commerce, National Telecommunications and Information Administration, and funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment of 2009.

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South Carolina Receiving $2.3 Million for Additional Broadband Mapping and Planning Initiatives

New Funding Will Increase the Scope of the Program And Facilitate Broadband Adoption Efforts

Columbia, SC — South Carolina will receive approximately $2.3 million from the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) to further implement broadband initiatives for a full five-year award period through Connect South Carolina, the designated entity for broadband mapping in the state.

The additional funding will allow mapping efforts under the State Broadband Data and Development (SBDD) program to continue for three additional years, while the initiative also focuses on projects that relate to broadband planning activities, such as the identification of barriers to the adoption of broadband and information technology services, the creation and facilitation of local technology planning teams, and the establishment of computer ownership and Internet access programs.

“Broadband is a vital tool for our students and workforce in today’s modern economy,” explains Brian Mefford, CEO of Connect South Carolina’s parent organization, Connected Nation. “This grant will allow Connect South Carolina to promote the investment of broadband in areas that have been overlooked and to create opportunities for increased broadband adoption where subscribership remains low. Through this collaborative, public-private effort, we will have the benefit of working across all sectors to advance South Carolina’s technological priorities and make sure its citizens can enjoy the full impact of a connected community.”

Connect South Carolina will continue to engage in broadband data collection activities that will capture complete and up-to-date datasets from the state’s broadband providers and will result in regularly-scheduled maintenance and further enhancements to South Carolina BroadbandStat, the state’s interactive broadband map.

The Connect South Carolina initiative released the state’s first interactive broadband map in May 2010, and this funding will enable the state to prioritize and track progress over a longer period of time. South Carolina’s BroadbandStat interactive mapping tool is now available at www.connectsc.org. The data represented there will also support the National Broadband Map scheduled to be unveiled by NTIA in February 2011.

To view a summary of the new grant project please visit: http://www2.ntia.doc.gov/grantee/connected-nation-south-carolina.

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Connect South Carolina Releases New Broadband Coverage Maps for the Statewide Broadband Initiative

Initiative Launches New Interactive Mapping App on Connect South Carolina Website

Columbia, SC – Connect South Carolina has launched a powerful new broadband app in the effort to bring affordable, high-speed Internet to the entire state. Available on Connect South Carolina’s website, www.connectsc.org, BroadbandStat is the interactive state mapping resource that puts all the latest information on the broadband landscape directly at your fingertips. Connect South Carolina is a subsidiary of Connected Nation and operates as a nonprofit in the state of South Carolina.

Connect South Carolina has been able to gather and verify state-specific data on the availability, speed, location, and type of broadband services as well as the adoption and availability of broadband at community anchor institutions across the state. The meeting of this milestone is a result of a several-month long process of aggressive outreach to providers and community anchor institutions across the state, and extensive verification and validation of the data collected from these entities. These initial maps include data from 34 state providers, key findings include:

• 95.32% of South Carolina households have access to terrestrial fixed broadband service of at least 768 Kbps downstream and 200 Kbps upstream (excluding mobile and satellite services).
• 4.68% of South Carolina households are unserved by a terrestrial fixed broadband provider, representing approximately 72,000 unserved households that do not have access to a fixed wireless or wired broadband service offering (excluding mobile and satellite service).
• With mobile broadband service included, 99.70% or 1,529,333 South Carolina households have access to broadband service of at least 768 Kbps downstream and 200 Kbps upstream.

A public demonstration of the program’s new interactive mapping feature, BroadbandStat, was held via webinar on Friday to encourage citizen verification and to demonstrate the broadband expansion scenario building that can be achieved using the tool.

Connected Nation’s GIS team will continuously refine the maps as more data is gathered - relying upon citizen feedback as part of the validation process. Residents, businesses, and any interested party with knowledge of the state broadband landscape are asked to go to Connect South Carolina’s website to provide input that will be used to verify and ensure the highest level of accuracy for the broadband maps.

On Connectsc.org, those who do not currently have broadband access can add their name and address to a secure database of households that would like to subscribe if given the opportunity. The collected information supports the creation of the broadband inventory map that will assist in expanding broadband delivery to residents across the state.

“We are excited to offer this interactive app to the citizens of South Carolina. With this new website, citizens can play an active role in the validation of the data and more importantly, use it as a resource to search provider options and draw attention to the areas that remain unserved,” explains Brian Mefford, CEO of Connect South Carolina’s parent organization, Connected Nation. “The goal of our nonprofit organization is to expand broadband access to areas where it doesn’t exist and improve the quality of service in areas that are already served. South Carolina’s newly completed map is the first major step in this process.”

As the designated entity for broadband mapping and planning in the state of South Carolina, Connect South Carolina is a public-private partnership uniting local governments, businesses, and citizens in the goal of increasing broadband service in the state’s unserved and underserved areas.

In December 2009, Connect South Carolina was awarded $1.7 million in Recovery Act funding in an effort to increase the availability and use of high-speed Internet service in the state. The funding enables the state to collect data to develop and maintain a detailed map of existing broadband service over two years and conduct planning efforts for a period of five years.

These efforts are in compliance with the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) for the State Broadband Data and Development grant program (SBDD). Ultimately, these data will populate the comprehensive, interactive, and searchable national broadband map that NTIA is required by the Recovery Act to create and make publicly available by February 17, 2011.



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About Connect South Carolina: Connect South Carolina is a subsidiary of Connected Nation and operates as a nonprofit in the state of South Carolina. The state of South Carolina is leading the initiative to increase broadband Internet access throughout South Carolina. Connect South Carolina was commissioned by the Governor’s Office to work with all broadband providers in the state of South Carolina to create detailed maps of broadband coverage in order to accurately pinpoint remaining gaps in broadband availability in South Carolina. www.connectsc.org.