What State Leaders Need to Know about Measuring Digital Skills: Options and Opportunities

As implementation of the $2.75 billion federal Digital Equity Act gets underway, state broadband officials and other policymakers are hurrying to put plans in place to measure the impact of these new investments. A key area of focus is digital skills—how to measure the baseline of residents’ current skills, what data digital skills program providers will need to collect and report on, how to set targets for improvement, and more. The field has not yet coalesced around a single list of digital skills that all individuals should possess. Given the diversity of ways that technology can be used and its rapidly evolving nature, a full consensus may never emerge. Policymakers and advocates can use a variety of approaches to better understand state residents’ current levels of digital skills and access, including: 

1. Analyzing existing survey data on self-reported skills.
2. Analyzing existing state administrative data as a proxy for skills and access.
3. Collecting new data on self-reported skills via surveys.
4. Collecting new data on skills via testing.
5. Collecting new data on skills as part of Digital Equity Act program reporting.