Benton Foundation, EducationSuperHighway Highlight E-rate Administration Flaws

The Benton Foundation and EducationSuperHighway met with Federal Communications Commission Wireline Competition Bureau staff and separately with legal advisors to Chairman Pai and Commissioners Rosenworcel and Starks on March 7, 2019, to discuss a white paper on E-rate. The paper identified three implementation areas that are preventing schools and students from taking full advantage of E-rate-enabled special construction projects: 1) the use of an undisclosed cost model to review a market-based competitive bidding process; 2) the use of an un-vetted questionnaire to review applications; and 3) the ambiguity around use of the cardinal change rule to force denial or reinstitution of bidding processes.