In January 2021, Nevada officials announced something remarkable: Every K-12 student learning remotely in the state now had a computer and an internet connection at home.
Connecting Kids Nevada, the public-private coalition formed under Gov. Steve Sisolak's (D) COVID-19 Task Force, had gone from being unable to confirm connectivity for more than 120,000 students to reaching 100 percent in the span of a few months, covering pupils in Nevada's 17 school districts as well as in public charter schools.
Connecting Kids Nevada was praised nationally as a successful "boots-on-the-ground" effort to close the digital divide. By any fair measure, it certainly was an impressive emergency response. As part of the ambitious initiative, Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford (D) secured roughly 18,000 hotspots through T-Mobile's Project 10Million. A virtual family support center in Clark County took more than 45,000 calls from families trying to get their kids online. Field agents went door to door finding students who had simply fallen off the grid.
Three-quarters of Nevada's public school students live in Clark County, which meant this was, in large part, a Las Vegas story.
As of 2021, according to UNLV's Data Hub, only about 1.4 percent of Clark County households lacked access to reliable broadband infrastructure, a dramatic improvement driven by years of federal investment that continues through 2026, including Nevada's share of the $416 million the state received through the federal Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program.
On paper, the county's infrastructure problem has narrowed considerably. But having a broadband line running past your house is not the same as being able to afford it.
Nevada's 2024 Statewide Digital Equity Plan identified affordability as one of the barriers to broadband access. In the survey, 64 percent of respondents reported spending more than $75 a month on internet service. Even among low-income households, 54 percent reported spending more than $75 a month.
The same divide appears nationally. Pew Research Center found that only 57 percent of adults in households earning less than $30,000 a year subscribe to broadband at home, compared with 95 percent of adults in households earning at least $100,000.
We've come a long way on closing the infrastructure gap. But we still have an affordability and adoption gap — and for students that can become an education gap.
Students without reliable home internet are less likely to complete their homework. Students without home internet, with slow connections or with cellphone-only service also had lower digital skills and, even after researchers accounted for socioeconomic and other factors, roughly half a letter grade lower GPAs than students with fast home internet. A hotspot or broadband line can get a student connected, but neither guarantees that connection will be affordable, reliable or sustainable.
There are signs Nevada is trying to address the digital affordability gap. In early 2025, Clark County received $10.7 million to promote enrollment in the federal Affordable Connectivity Program in high-need communities. The county convened community organizations, workforce programs and county agencies to prepare for implementation, and its broader plan envisions more than 20 partners providing services including device distribution, technical support and digital literacy programs.
However, the program ended when its grant did, leaving Clark County to find other ways to pay for promoting broadband adoption. Temporary funding can expand access, but it cannot guarantee that families will be able to afford and maintain broadband service over the long term.
If Nevada is serious about closing the digital divide, success cannot be measured only by whether high-speed internet reaches a family's home. It should also mean asking whether families can afford the monthly bill, whether students have reliable devices and the skills to use them, and whether those connections last after temporary funding disappears. That means publicly tracking affordability and adoption alongside infrastructure, asking families whether programs are reaching them and planning for sustainability before grant money runs out.
Clark County is home to families like the ones I grew up around and now work alongside: families who don't always have the language, the time or the institutional access to advocate loudly for themselves when a program's benefits quietly stop reaching them. They deserve more than another declaration that the divide has been closed. They deserve an honest accounting of who is actually connected and who can afford to stay that way.
Unfortunately, Nevada's track record on follow-through with digital equity is thin. We announced victory once already, in a press release, without ever considering a rigorous look at what "100 percent connectivity" actually meant for learning outcomes in the years after. The dramatic difference in broadband subscription rates based on income tells us plainly that infrastructure access alone was never going to be the whole fix.
We have the chance to do this differently. Nevada's ongoing broadband investments and new education pilots are still young enough to be shaped by real accountability instead of another press release proclaiming success. That means funding evaluation alongside implementation, not as an afterthought. It means asking families, not just school districts, whether the help reached them and whether it was enough. And it means being willing to say publicly if something isn't working — instead of waiting for a pandemic to force our hand again.
Ma. Alexandra Alvarez is a Las Vegas-based legal professional with an interest in the intersection of education and technology. She studied the Connecting Kids Nevada initiative as part of her graduate work focused on global technology and development.
