All Nevada students can now access internet from home, group says

The organizers of an initiative to improve Nevada students’ access to distance learning said Tuesday that all state students now have access to a computer and internet at home.

Connecting Kids Nevada — a public-private partnership between dozens of community groups, 17 state school districts and the Nevada Department of Education — said Tuesday that volunteers have reached every district and charter school student who is participating in distance learning and helped them connect to the internet if they did not already have access from home.

Nevada is one of the first states in the nation to have confirmed this access for its students, according to State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jhone Ebert.

“Thanks to the unprecedented response of the Connecting Kids coalition, every single Nevada public school student participating in digital learning – no matter where they live or go to school – now has the tools to connect to school from home,” Ebert said.

Connecting Kids is a product of the state’s COVID-19 task force, and began its work in early August, as schools announced they would begin the academic year virtually amid the pandemic. The coalition found at the time that schools had not been able to confirm whether 120,000 Nevada students would be able to access to their virtual classrooms.

The groups began contacting students through the virtual Family Support Center, which fielded 45,000 calls and connected 18,000 families to low- and no-cost internet, according to the statement.

Field agents from the Clark County School District, Clark County and the cities of Las Vegas and North Las Vegas also went door to door in search of missing students, offering help to connect with their schools.

“Nevada accomplished this for our children through unprecedented cooperation coming from every corner of the state, said Elaine Wynn, former president of the State Board of Education and co-chair of Connecting Kids Nevada. “This achievement is further evidence that when people of good heart and intention come together, they can solve a community’s most daunting problems.”

Contact Aleksandra Appleton at 702-383-0218 or aappleton@reviewjournal.com. Follow @aleksappleton on Twitter.