Orgs, internet providers win $1.6 million for Blount County broadband, web literacy

Two colleges, a telecom provider and an area government recently won more than $1.6 million in grant funds meant to improve high-speed internet access and digital literacy in Blount County.

In a press release Tuesday, April 30, Tennessee state officials announced that Spectrum Southeast, the Blount County government, Maryville College and the University of Tennessee, among many others, will receive dollars designed to expand broadband internet access, digital opportunity training and projects involving public wi-fi provision.

The investments in Blount County are one part of a broader statewide effort to widen access to high-speed internet and create digital opportunities for Tennesseans. “More than $715 million has been invested to expand broadband under Governor Lee’s administration, and we are excited to announce additional funding today that will ensure Tennesseans have access to and benefit from high-speed internet, which opens the door to high-quality job training,” Tennessee Department of Economic and Community Development Commissioner Stuart C. McWhorter said in the release.

Broadband in Blount

Many of the grants through TNECD are designed to help provide people in what the state literature refers to as “underserved” communities with access to higher-speed connections. In Blount County, federal data suggests, such communities are largely rural ones.

A 2019 Federal Communications Commission report shows a 30-point divide in speeds accessed by rural residents of the county and those accessed by people living in urban areas. According to information in the report, 95.9% of Blount’s urban dwellers had access to a relatively higher rate of internet speed. People in Blount’s rural areas had access to the same high speed 65.7% of the time.

The state is offering support for both companies and public entities working on digital skills training for Tennesseans, as well as for those making internet connection devices more economical. Spectrum Southeast, a trade name for Charter Communications, secured a state grant worth $291,729.98, for use in Blount County, that will be used to facilitate middle-mile connectivity.

Also aiming to improve broadband availability, the county government at the same time won a $100,000 grant from the state’s Broadband Ready Community program, just months after the Blount board of commissioners voted to apply for BRC designation. The grant itself is non-competitive, according to information available on the state’s website.

Potential uses of the BRC grant, according to the release, are: education, cost offsets for internet devices and marketing of low-cost internet plans, among other things.

Educational outlook

Together, Maryville College and the University of Tennessee won $1.28 million in grants for use in Blount County, through the TNECD Digital Skills, Employment and Workforce Development program. The program was designed to “to creat(e) a pipeline for well-paying digital jobs,” according to the Tuesday release.

The grant is funded by the Tennessee Emergency Broadband Fund — American Rescue Plan.

Maryville College won $776,814 through the DSEW program. Niklas Trzaskowski, director of the college’s career center, told The Daily Times that the funds would support a new program — Maryville College Digital Edge — that “will offer students, faculty, and staff the opportunity to strengthen their digital skills by completing industry-relevant online courses, which will be offered through an online courseware provider, and of which some could lead to microcredentials.”

“Groups of faculty, staff, and students would participate in this program through a series of cohorts beginning in Fall of 2024 and lasting through Fall of 2026,” Trzaskowski said over email.

Maryville College Director of Grant Development Amy Grant told the newspaper that funds for the grant must be spent by December 31, 2026. Maryville College will bear 10% of the total program budget. Grant also noted that college collaborated with area institutions on the project. The Blount Partnership, she said, “inform(ed) our proposal and program design for our grant application and will serve as a key program partner for this grant-funded program.”

UT, likewise, secured $512,916 in total under the DSEW program, with the dollars divided among Anderson, Blount, Bradley, Campbell, Cocke, Cumberland, Grainger, Hamblen, Jefferson, Knox, Loudon, McMinn, Meigs, Monroe, Morgan, Rhea, Roane, Scott, Sevier and Union counties.