Episode description

The inequities of the digital divide and its impact on low-income students became mainstream news during the pandemic. The overnight shift to a national lockdown requiring students to attend school virtually put a spotlight on the lack of internet access across the U.S. In fact, “one in five teens, ages 13 to 17, reported being unable to do their homework ‘often’ or ‘sometimes’ because of unreliable Internet access. Twelve million children were without internet access altogether,” (Havard Business Review).

Returning Voices of eLearning podcast guest Mylayna Albright, Assistant Vice President, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) at AT&T, joins Host JW Marshall to discuss how AT&T is working to close the digital divide. Albright is clearly passionate about her work as she shares what inspires her to do the work she does.

She noted that having grown up in the inner city of Cleveland, she knows that the work she’s doing “impacts the families and the children who still live in the communities that I come from.”  Specifically, AT&T’s new program The AchieverySM which “is a free, online digital learning platform. It’s a platform that’s specifically for K-12 students. It’s also a program to help their parents with assisting in their learning. It’s a program that we hope is entertaining, that is inspiring, that is engaging in a way that allows students to adapt the internet a lot more,” said Albright.

The program was inspired by research that collected feedback and insights from students, teachers and parents indicating that students would do better with online learning if it was a bit more entertaining. So, AT&T partnered with Warner Bros. Discovery to create an engaging platform that utilizes Warner Bros. content for educational purposes – clips from popular TV shows, movies, and animated series paired with learning activities to take virtual learning to another level.

“Part of our AT&T Connected LearningSM program. AT&T Connected LearningSM  was born out of AT&Ts overall companywide commitment to a 3-year, two-billion dollar investment to help narrow the digital divide,” said Albright.