New Initiatives Signal Shift in U.S. Ed-Tech Leadership

Federal government emphasizes its role as agent of collaboration

In what appear to be the latest moves in a shift of emphasis from financing to facilitating education technology, the U.S. Department of Education and the Federal Communications Commission this month both have helped launch initiatives that were billed as major breakthroughs but involved the two organizations as agents of collaboration, not primary funders.

Last week, FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski attended as Philadelphia-based Comcast Corp. officially announced its Internet Essentials program, which will give families of students who receive free school lunches access to broadband Internet service for $9.95 a month, before taxes.

The move came in response to the FCC’s call for Internet providers to offer cheaper access to disadvantaged and underserved students, Mr. Genachowski said. Comcast, which announced the service on Sept. 20 at an event at Ballou High School in Washington, is receiving neither aid nor a tax break from the federal government for offering the service. It is, however, doing so based on a condition the FCC and Comcast negotiated into Comcast’s acquisition in January of NBC Universal, the parent company of TV...