Education: Government Internet Subsidy Stretched to Its Limits "The point of the program is to make things more affordable," Hershman said. "There's been more demand than they thought there would be. There are still very poor schools that haven't been able to make the cut off." With help from e-rate discounts, 98 percent of U.S. public schools now have Internet connections, according to new statistics issued this month by the Education Department's National Center for Education Statistics. But only 77 percent of instructional classrooms have Internet connections, and the number drops to 60 percent for schools with the highest concentrations of poverty. Despite continued demand for education technology funding, lawmakers and advocates for the e-rate are not clamoring for more money, nor are the telephone companies that have been contributing to the fund offering to ante up more. http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/15/technology/16EDUCATION.html?pagewanted=all