Fidelity Works to Close Digital Divide for Students Through Chromebooks

Fidelity Works to Close Digital Divide for Louisiana Students Through Chromebook Donation

June 2, 2021 – New Roads, LA – As K-12 schools end another challenging year in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, Fidelity Communications is working to close the digital divide for students at Rosenwald Elementary School in New Roads, Louisiana with the donation of Chromebooks through the company’s Chromebooks for Kids initiative.

Senior Vice President of Technology Services Ken Johnson said that both educators and students need access to the tools and technology that will set them up for future success.

“Now more than ever, student access to computers is a necessity,” Johnson said. “By donating Chromebooks, we’re giving students in need the opportunity to use technology that will ultimately prepare them for a progressively digital workforce.”

Rosenwald Elementary School Principal Kent Smith said that Fidelity’s Chromebook donation will provide second and third graders, who continue to have significant deficits in reading and math due to “lost learning” caused by the recent pandemic, access to technology they can use in the classroom and at home.

"Having access to this technology gives our students the opportunity to extend classroom instruction into their homes so if needed they can complete follow up activities to newly learned lessons and be given real-time feedback from their teachers after school hours,” Smith said. “Research shows that students in second and third grade are at a point where reading fluency becomes a learned skill and without this every grade after gets harder and harder. With these Chromebooks, our second and third graders will be able to attain these skills and that sets them up for success.”

Over the past eight years, Fidelity, along with the other Cable One family of brands, has donated more than 2,000 Chromebooks to Title I schools in the markets it serves.