Access Denied:
Do Wisconsin's programs close the digital divide?
by Bryan N. Barnes

Three ITA students hard at work. Photo by Bryan N. Barnes

David, 14, clenches his mouse-hand into a fist. He’s having trouble getting a button to roll over on his new horror movie Web site. And that isn’t the lone source of his frustration. In the basement of the UW-Madison Computer Science building on a Saturday morning, he also has to deal with a fellow student who considers herself an expert. David foolishly mentions to her that he can’t get the rollover to work.

“Du-UUUHH! Are you dumb or something? I showed you how it works,” says Niya, also 14. She stomps around the desk and jams her finger into the corner of his computer monitor, “Click on that one.” He moves the pointer over the button in question, but it’s the wrong one. “Oh, no, I mean that one,” Niya says, shifting her finger, leaving a smear on the screen. David again follows her directions, and again it’s the wrong button. “No stupid, it’s THAT one,” Niya sputters. He clicks, and a window appears on his screen. “Don’t type the file, browse for it. DUH!” she quips.

“I wasn’t going to type it,” David protests.

“Whatever, loser,” she says, making an “L” with her fingers against her forehead.

David and Niya’s terse exchange parallels an equally divisive battle between those who warn about a “digital divide” and those who already claim victory over that divide. Simply put, the digital divide is the separation between the technology “haves” and “have-nots”—the Niyas who know technology and the Davids who struggle. The price tag for this divide in education and, more broadly, in society, is steep. It means some students are denied the opportunity of an education enhanced by technology while others leapfrog ahead.

The media commonly use the term “digital divide” with an assumption that everyone knows exactly what it is. The term, though widely applied, is heard most in reference to education. The implied image is one of schools with high-tech computer labs staffed with Microsoft-certified trainers versus dilapidated, candle-lit schoolhouses where a dusty Commodore or Tandy sits in the corner gathering dust. The scenario becomes even more dire when considering the futures of these students in an increasingly information-based economy, where a privileged few will get jobs with ease while the rest will be left behind.

Concerns prompt reforms
In the late 90s, the perception of a growing digital divide prompted both government and private groups in Wisconsin to attempt to bridge the gap between schools. The UW-Madison Division of Information Technology (DoIT) started one such attempt in 2000. As support for a new UW plan to increase the diversity of the student body, DoIT created the Information Technology Academy. ITA offers four years of computer training to Madison-area high school students, specifically students of color and the underprivileged. ITA tracks the students’ academic performance and offers tutors when needed. And the academy offers a tuition grant to each student if admitted to UW-Madison.

This was a tempting package for David, a freshman at Madison West High School. However, it wasn’t the academic help or the tuition that drew David to ITA.

“I chose a career in the 8th grade, and I wanted to be a software engineer,” David says. If he succeeds, David, who is multiracial with both Native American and African American heritage, will be a rare representative in an industry historically dominated by Europeans and Asians. David doesn’t really care about that, though. “I want to go [to the UW], and I just want to have a good job.”

Photo by Danielle Chase

ITA accepted David into the program during his final year at James C. Wright Middle School in Madison. With the help of DoIT staff, he has already started learning things like basic Web site construction and graphic design. David also received a new computer, printer and dial-up service from the academy. “I do my homework on it every night, pretty much.” Only after a little prodding does David reveal that he also likes playing Pac-Man on the new computer, as well as chatting with his friends through AOL Instant Messenger.

Despite the occasional recreational use of his computer, David seems to be on his way to jumping over the digital divide with the help of ITA. It’s even led him to potential summer employment: “I might get a job at Ace Hardware. They might hire me to make a Web site for them,” he says.

Is the digital divide closed?
David’s success may be indicative of a growing trend. According to a July 23 Washington Post article, the digital divide has virtually disappeared. This determination was based upon research conducted by the University of California at Los Angeles, the Pew Research Center and the federal government. The Bush Administration quickly seized on this data and declared victory over the divide, arguing that funding can now be cut for programs that try to bring computers to low-income Americans.

Not so fast, say UW-Madison experts.

“The digital divide is not ‘nearly closed’ by a long shot,” says Assistant Professor Greg Downey, a cyberspace geographer with the UW-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication. He argues that even the 2002 National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) survey, produced under the Bush Administration, shows the nationwide average for household Internet access is barely over 50 percent.

“This is not ‘universal household access’ by any means,” Downey says. “The 50 percent national average figure still hides great divides.”

Part of the problem with tackling this issue, Downey explains, is that society hasn’t agreed on a definition of “digital divide.” He says we must define the phrase in terms of key skills, conditions, and costs required to effectively use computer-mediated communications as a substitute for physical social processes like consumption, education, production and personal social interaction.

“For example,” Downey says, “neither using ‘WebTV’ in the home or spending 30 minutes on an ‘Internet kiosk’ in the local library are effective substitutes for unrestricted broadband Web access from one's own private, uncensored, unmonitored, fast, large-screen computer—at home or at work—where one can not only ‘surf’ the Net, but upload, download, save, manipulate, print, process and produce materials in the online world.”

Adding to the problem of a vague definition is the rapid advance of computer technology, a characteristic unique to the Internet when compared to older, more static communication technologies.

“My 19-inch cable-ready color TV was purchased in 1989 and still serves me just fine,” Downey says. “My push-button telephone is about 20 years old by now, and still works with the latest voice-mail systems. But find me someone who still uses a 1989 or 1982 PC to do serious work on the Web.”

Because of the endless forward march of digital hardware, the divide may present a relentless social challenge. However, Downey says that failure to address this issue will ultimately hurt everyone, not just low-income Americans.

“The more people there are online, the more valuable the online world is to all of those people.”

Despite this potential, Downey sees Wisconsin ultimately failing to bridge the gap.

“The current state government wants to cut the department of e-government; cut funding to education, arguably the most effective site for combating digital divides of many sorts; and somehow attract ‘good jobs,’ a.k.a. information-age jobs, to the state by doing so,” Downey says.

“I think all of this will end up putting Wisconsin on the wrong side of the digital divide in many ways.”

Candice, another ITA participant and a junior at Middleton High School, partially agrees. “Middleton hasn’t really done anything to bridge that gap. Memorial [High School] does a better job, they gave us computer classes.”

Candice is also multiracial, with a mother who is white and a father who is African American. She has noticed other students, including those of color, falling behind in high school due to the digital divide. “A couple of my friends don’t have computers,” she says. “They have to go to the library and use the PCs at school, which limits their time. It’s holding them back.”

Do Wisconsin's programs go far enough?
This echoes a report the Pew Internet & American Life Project released in March. Widely referenced in the media, the Pew report found that 12 percent of Internet users can only log on from school, libraries, work or someplace other than their homes. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel also analyzed a Commerce Department report from the same month and found “half of black and Hispanic people who use the Internet at public libraries can't log on from home, compared with only 30% of whites and 22% of Asians.”

Several critics have used this data to find faults with Wisconsin’s approach to the digital divide. The UW-Madison Sociology Department’s Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS) has researched the digital divide in the state and found while Wisconsin has made some progress, there is a long way to go.

In November 2001, COWS re-released a report on Wisconsin’s digital divide as part of its Sustaining Wisconsin outreach program. Interpreting NTIA’s data on a state level, the report argued that to best combat the digital divide, Wisconsin must focus on improving its disadvantaged schools in both building maintenance and IT infrastructure while also addressing its sales tax.

Though Wisconsin schools are 90 percent hard-wired for the Internet, COWS insists this may be a futile first step. The report cited data from the state that 29 percent of schools have not received a major renovation since their original construction, creating a budget problem for poorer, older school districts facing a choice between leaky roofs and new computer equipment and training.

The COWS report also targeted Wisconsin’s sales tax, which ignores Internet sales. According to the report, unless something is done, this policy will continue to shift the sales tax burden from affluent e-commerce users to low-income buyers who can only rely on the traditional, physical marketplace.

COWS recommends that Wisconsin try to “engage disconnected populations” and show them the importance of computer-mediated communication in advancing their economic and civic lives. ITA may be a first step in doing just that, but the program seems to be fighting an overwhelming battle.

“Ours is the only [program] I know of with this size and scope in the area,” says Erica Rosch, the ITA Program Coordinator. “We try to find those who slipped through the cracks. We do this by getting the word out to the middle schools, especially counselors and teachers, to get them looking for candidates. We even did a few newspaper and radio ads.” It was only after ITA offered the tuition grants that they were able to consistently fill their classes—today they have to narrow the applicant pool of roughly 30 down to 15 per year.

Funding drives these capacity limits. Though they have received considerable support from DoIT and the UW, ITA still seeks help from private donors. Although Rosch says Microsoft founder Bill Gates has already turned them down, ITA has had some success: Dell donates 32 computers to the program each year and Macromedia and Symantec have donated software licenses for every student.

“We started out slow in both money and people,” Rosch says. Today, though, things are looking better. Four “cohorts” have been formed, one for each year of high school. A large percentage of the students are multiracial, with the next largest group being Asian and then African American. A few students from each class are there more because of their economic status than their race.

As for the future, Rosch hopes the students will return after they graduate to serve as mentors to new ITA students, thus giving back to the program. “We also want to provide post-program support for the students as well. We don’t want to get them [to the UW] and then forget about them. I mean, eventually DoIT wants to hire these kids. We have a projected IT workforce shortfall at the UW because of the brain drain statewide.”

Some ITA students, however, have different plans. “Personally, I don’t plan on having a job in technology,” says Lance, a junior in the academy from Madison East High School. Lance wants to become a lawyer or psychologist. Candice, on the other hand, hopes to go to medical school with the goal of entering pediatrics. Although neither plans on entering an information technology field, they both intend to use their ITA skills. “In the future, being able to use technology will be useful in everything,” Lance says. “It will be a basic skill in the future, not an extra skill.”

Still a problem
Unfortunately, even if ITA tripled enrollment and expanded admissions beyond the Madison area, the arguments of Downey and COWS raise doubts whether ITA alone would be able to combat Wisconsin’s digital divide in education. Yet, there is hope. Wisconsin’s Chief Information Officer, Rebecca Heidepriem, released a report in July that set the state’s strategy on this issue. The centerpiece of the education section of the plan is the Technology for Educational Achievement (TEACH) program. This program, started in 1997, is responsible for bringing high-speed Internet access in Wisconsin schools up to the 90 percent mentioned in the COWS report. Though COWS argues this coverage has lulled the state into inaction, they do acknowledge that providing such expansive access is part of the long-term solution. Furthermore, as the academy develops, there is the potential for ITA to serve as a statewide model for how to best encourage students of color and the underprivileged to embrace information technology.

As for Niya and David, Niya still terrorizes David during each ITA class for a reason as yet unclear to him. “She’s just a wild girl,” he says, scratching his head. Underneath the software engineer dreams and the burgeoning Web skills, a confused 14-year-old boy is trying to figure out girls. What’s more, when he talks about Niya, David doesn’t sound like he’s on the far side of any divide from the rest of Wisconsin.

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