PENNSYLVANIA (WHTM) -- Many Pennsylvanians have access to high speed internet, but others do not. Some people call it "the digital divide."
Internet access disparity makes it more difficult for kids to learn, people to work, and patients to seek healthcare.
A bipartisan congressional bill plans to close the digital divide.
The Mifflin County School District has just under 5,000 students over 400 rural square miles. Superintendent Vance Varner says 80 percent of families say their internet is good enough.
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"There might have been half of those that could not sustain two iPads at one time if you have multiple kids at home during the day. And the parents might have been doing remote work, and what was happening was some of our kids were zooming they had to take the video off and just listen in," said Varner.
Even during abc27's interview with Varner, internet issues prevailed.
"It just came up, my internet connection is not stable. I'm sitting in school district office at administration building," Varner added. "You froze for a little bit. That's not on your end."
Governor Wolf spoke about the importance of internet access for all.
"The lack of affordable accessible broadband is slowing our state's economic growth and it's leaving too many people behind," Wolf said.
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Wolf recently accepted a $6.6 million down payment for the federal government's "Internet for All" initiative.
The goal of the initiative?
"To ensure that everyone across the commonwealth has access to high-speed internet and the digital skills they need to use the technology," said Kevin Gallagher of the United States Department of Commerce.
The $6 million payment was to develop a plan to reach the initiative's goal. The federal government is promising at least $90 million more to implement the plan.
Wolf assured that the spending will have oversight.
"What we want to end up with is every Pennsylvanian having access to the internet. What we don't want is to spend all this money and then not having done that," Wolf said.
Mifflin County wants to offer a 21st century education, like the underwater robotics competitions that are popular among students.
"That's all designed on the internet when kids are doing this kind of stuff, so when you and I went to school is long gone. And we want it to be, we always want them to have it better than we had it," Varner added.
Pennsylvania was promised at least $100 million from a $50 billion pool of money at the federal level.
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