Handing out laptops and hot-spot devices was a good first step in attempting to close New Jersey’s digital divide. But a new study finds the affordability of high-speed internet access remains the real barrier for families.
Newark-based nonprofits Project Ready and Newark Trust for Education dug into the issue and showed that households in the lowest income brackets have internet access at roughly half the speed of families with higher incomes. Newark — where even people whose homes were wired for broadband can’t afford it — was at the epicenter of that digital divide.
Project Ready CEO Shennell McCloud joins NJ Spotlight News to discuss the study.
