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Professor Yoo named External Expert for Broadband Commission Working Group on School Connectivity

February 28, 2020

With Professor Christopher S. Yoo as one of its External Experts, the Broadband Commission Working Group will also serve as an advisory group to GIGA, UNICEF and ITU’s global school connectivity initiative.

Christopher S. Yoo, the John H. Chestnut Professor of Law, Communication and Computer & Information Science, University of Pennsylvania, has been named an External Expert for the Broadband Commission Working Group on the Common Bid for School Connectivity. The group will also serve as an advisory group for GIGA, a UNICEF and ITU-backed project centered on global school connectivity that aims to connect every school to the internet by 2030.

“The Broadband Commission on Sustainable Development is playing a critical role in helping to connect the unconnected,” Yoo said. “Penn’s 1 World Connected project is one of few sources of real-world case studies that can help ground these efforts on a sound empirical foundation.”

Building on the research and scholarship of Working Group members, the group will focus on connecting schools around the world and provide key advice and advocacy efforts with the goal of “ensuring that every young person has access to information, opportunity, and choice.”

According to UNICEF Director Henrietta Fore, over 360 million young people around the world lack access to the digital age because of poverty, geography, or other circumstances. Moreover, a 2019 Broadband Commission reportsupports the finding that a 10 percent increase in mobile broadband deployment caused a 0.8 percent increase in the GDP.

The Working Group will also provide guidance regarding the financing and development of the e-schools initiative as well as focus on issues of technologies, business models, the link between quality teaching and inclusive learning, and improving the employability of students.

Members of the group include key players in various disciplines, including academics, ICT (Information and Communications Technology) industry professionals, intergovernmental organization representatives, policymakers, and regulators.

Yoo also serves as Founding Director of the Law School’s Center for Technology, Innovation and Competition (CTIC) in addition to leading the 1 World Connected initiative.