By Edward Henderson
Cox Business made a special announcement today at Valencia Park Elementary School. They revealed a partnership with San Diego Unified School District that will construct 54 miles of fiber to deliver a 175-gigabit network to schools throughout the San Diego Area. In total, 189 schools will be connected, with a total of 136,000 students and teachers served. A project of this size that usually takes two years to complete took Cox only 11 months to implement. The system will be online at the end of November.
The partnership came from the result of a year long bidding process between several companies to provide the district with high speed internet. Representatives from Cox and the San Diego Unified School District held a press conference to provide details and insight on the process along with their excitement for the opportunities students will have with access. Students will also receive personal computers they can take home and return at the end of the school year.
“The beautiful thing about the internet is that its the ultimate meritocracy,” said Larry Coval, Vice President of Cox Business. “There’s really no limits to what can be accomplished with the access we’re providing to these campuses. Its up to the educators and the students themselves to make the most out of this. If they’re interested in something that’s going on across the world. They have instant access to the information that allows them to truly know whats going on and become a whole lot smarter about it a whole lost faster.”
After the announcement, the press and officials went to Valencia Park’s library to witness students receive their computers and take photos.
“One of the things that I’ve been very interested in is leveling the playing field so that children in all districts can have access to information and the internet,” said Dr. Sharon Whitehurst-Payne, School Board Rep for District E. “With this it brings us up to speed with the top level internet access. In the past if they were interested in a topic they couldn’t go further. Now with the internet and a laptop they can go as far as they want to go. It makes little geniuses explode all over they area. That’s what I’m excited about.”
