Revealed: The Government's broadband plan for your kid's school
Canterbury may be having its problems, but the region is leading the way when it comes to fibre broadband in schools.
The Government is beginning to ramp up its programme to fulfil a commitment that 97.7% of schools will have Ultra Fast Broadband (UFB) by mid-2015.
The plan involves connecting schools either through the urban UFB fibre network currently being built by four telcos (Chorus, Northpower, Ultrafast Fibre and Enable Networks) or the Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) supplied by Telecom and Vodafone.
But new data obtained by TechDay shows Canterbury schools are already well on their way to achieving full connectivity, while in other regions, including Auckland, only a fraction of schools have fibre connections so far.
We matched official information on each of the country’s 2560 schools with Ministry of Economic Development data on the UFB/RBI rollout to schools. Our data matching revealed more than 6% of schools (168) with a combined roll of almost 92,00 students already had fibre connections by August last year.
Almost half of the fibre-connected schools (81) are in Canterbury, while only nine are in Auckland and six in Wellington.
Why are Canterbury schools so far ahead of the curve for fibre connectivity? The region is home to the Greater Christchurch Schools Network Trust which oversees a network built by local telco Enable Networks and aims to foster 'a community of connected schools'.
This worthy goal ties in well with students’ 'significant demand for connectivity' that was identified in a Commerce Commission report released this week on the uptake of UFB in the education and health sectors.
So while Christchurch is well served to meet that student demand for broadband, how is the UFB/RBI programme tracking for schools in other regions?
Details on exactly when individual schools will receive their UFB/RBI connections have not been released by the Ministry of Economic Development and Crown Fibre Holdings – the two agencies negotiating with the telcos building the infrastructure.
However, the Government has said it expects 221 urban schools, with a combined roll of almost 100,000 students, will be connected to UFB by June 30 this year.
Our analysis found 1294 schools – 50% of all schools – are scheduled for eventual connection to the network. A further 6% are already connected to fibre, with the remaining 44% destined for inclusion in the rural upgrade initiative.
Based on rolls, 80% of students will eventually access the internet through the UFB network, with the rest (except for a tiny percentage at a handful of the most isolated schools) connecting via the RBI.
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