Low-income families in the UK are facing a ‘digital blackout’, which prevents children from succeeding at school and negatively impacts their future professional opportunities. That’s according to a new survey by the Digital Poverty Alliance and RM Technology, an education-tech company.
Digital exclusion – where some individuals lack the skills or access to digital technologies needed to participate fully in society – was well-documented during the heights of the Covid pandemic, when children were, at points, tasked with learning at home. But years later the problem remains.
The survey of 2,000 parents and 600 teachers found that more than half of children in low-income families struggle to access devices or reliable internet outside of school. A third of parents say schools assume incorrectly that families have access to digital tools at home, when in reality pupils are often forced to share one device with their parents and siblings. One in 10 families have no device other than a smartphone to complete online schoolwork. And many children rely on neighbours, friends or public Wi-Fi networks for internet access to study or complete assignments.
Just because a child uses TikTok does not mean they know how to power up a computer, write an email or use Word
“If somebody cannot get online where, when and how they need to, they are experiencing digital exclusion and fundamentally they can’t get the best out of online services,” says Elizabeth Anderson, the CEO of the Digital Poverty Alliance.
Children from low-income families, who are already excluded from many educational opportunities thanks to socioeconomic factors, are worse affected by digital exclusion. Lacking access to the tools they need for learning, these children could lose ambition or confidence and fail to achieve qualifications for future success.
Educators also acknowledge that poor digital access is causing pupils to fall behind or disengage from learning. One third of teachers believe that children lack the skills to use technology, while the same share claim their schools have no plans to address the digital exclusion outside of the classroom. What’s more, nearly two in five (38%) recognise that the digital divide deepens during the holidays.
According to Mel Parker, an educational technologist at RM Technology and a former teacher, digital exclusion not only damages children’s school-learning experiences, it also limits their options for work or higher education. Students with no digital devices often struggle to apply for part-time jobs and submit college applications, she explains. “We take all these things for granted.”
With the school summer holidays coming to a close, the report paints a bleak picture of the digital divide in the UK. – one that appears at odds with the government’s ambition to become an AI superpower.
Addressing the digital divide
It is not as if this government or previous ones have completely turned a blind eye to the digital divide in education, however. During the pandemic, the government issued grants for schools to buy digital devices, such as laptops. The current government recently concluded a consultation on the digital divide in schools and committed to “ending the postcode lottery” of connectivity in education. All schools in the UK will be required to meet six new technology standards by 2030.
To close the digital divide, however, the government will need better data on its scope and impact. Gathering this data is difficult, as many students are reluctant to admit that they lack access to technology.
Parker recalls one student, for example, who would turn up late to lessons and joke that he’d been “stuck in the science corridor”. When Covid forced school closures and moved classes online, the student would still show up late to lessons and offer the same explanation, which was funnier because of the obvious absurdity. But in reality he was late because he and his two siblings were sharing just one device. “He was trying to make light of it in front of his peers,” Parker says . “Students don’t want to own up to it.”
To develop a better understanding of the digital divide, schools and local authorities should attempt to remove the common stigma around digital exclusion, so the problem is better reported. They should survey parents and children to understand who has access to a computer, broadband or Wi-Fi at home, says Anderson, adding that more deliberate, targeted conversations would help to reveal the scale of the problem across the country.
Device access needed to develop core skills
When generation Z entered the workplace, many commentators erroneously predicted that their experience using smartphones and other digital devices from a young age indicated innate foundational digital skills.
But that myth soon collapsed. The digital skills that are needed in the workplace are very different from those used to navigate smartphone apps. Swiping through endless streams of algorithmically curated video content requires a different kind of engagement than locating documents or folders in a file tree or backing up a Word doc, for instance.
“Just because a child uses TikTok does not mean they know how to power up a computer, write an email, set up and change passwords to stay safe, or use Word, Excel or Canva,” says Anderson.
When families are forced to share smartphones or tablets rather than computers or laptops, children may fail to build core digital skills needed for work. The closure of public libraries across the UK, disproportionately affecting deprived areas, has further limited many young people’s opportunities to experiment with computers.
According to the Digital Poverty Alliance, helping children develop core digital skills starts with ensuring equitable access to devices. To achieve this, the organisation has devised a pilot project to acquire functional but out-of-date computers from businesses, wipe them and give them to school children that need them most. But such initiatives require nationwide backing and greater local engagement to truly address the problem of digital exclusion.
“We need a community focus to take away some of the stigma,” says Anderson. “That needs to be led by schools, but with national funding and a realisation that IT infrastructure is not just about infrastructure within the school but how students can actually access it.”
Low-income families in the UK are facing a 'digital blackout', which prevents children from succeeding at school and negatively impacts their future professional opportunities. That's according to a new survey by the Digital Poverty Alliance and RM Technology, an education-tech company.
Digital exclusion – where some individuals lack the skills or access to digital technologies needed to participate fully in society – was well-documented during the heights of the Covid pandemic, when children were, at points, tasked with learning at home. But years later the problem remains.
The survey of 2,000 parents and 600 teachers found that more than half of children in low-income families struggle to access devices or reliable internet outside of school. A third of parents say schools assume incorrectly that families have access to digital tools at home, when in reality pupils are often forced to share one device with their parents and siblings. One in 10 families have no device other than a smartphone to complete online schoolwork. And many children rely on neighbours, friends or public Wi-Fi networks for internet access to study or complete assignments.
