Is your school district limited when it comes to the budget? Do you need more funds to advance technology and create a better learning environment for your students? Technology in schools is on the rise and part of this is thanks to the government funded E-Rate savings program. The E-Rate program was created to make prices more affordable and allow school districts access to technology that might not be within budget otherwise.

Surprisingly, many suburban schools do not even apply for this program. In our opinion, this is like throwing away money. If you want to learn more about how to best utilize government funding, let us give you some suggestions.  

Over the next five years your school could get up to $150 per student from E-Rate savings. So now you can upgrade your network infrastructure and WiFi without worrying about where to find extra room in the budget to afford it. If your wiring is old and needs to be replaced, you can get money for that too. The percentage of money you receive should be close to what you have been getting for your circuits.

Beware.. This is not the same process as the old Priority 1. You need to make sure that your E-Rate consultant is familiar with what used to be called Priority 2. We suggest you get references from schools that were successful getting money in the past to find a good consultant. If you do not use an E-Rate consultant, you may want to start because they can help optimize your savings.

It is critical to have a long term plan because you only can receive this money every five years. Do you want it to go to waste because of improper planning? We didn’t think so. The time is now to build E-Rate into your technology plan. Leverage it and make your money go further!