2023-08-19 09:12:00
More than six thousand students from one hundred schools in Amazonas and Pará will finally be able to stay connected with high-speed internet. This will be possible thanks to an action by Instituto Escola Conectada, MegaEdu and Starlink, which provided the equipment.
The project started when Starlink approached Instituto Escola Conectada with MegaEdu to create a plan to install antennas in remote regions, with priority given to teaching institutions where there is no high-speed broadband.
Among the schools served are 100 indigenous, quilombola and institutions from the cities of Moju (PA), Presidente Figueiredo, Manicoré and Itacoatiara (AM).
Raul Fuchs, founder and partner of the Datora group, which started the Instituto Escola Conectada, says that many of the schools in these regions did not have any kind of connection:
There are thousands of students who had practically no access to connectivity and who will now have an education with high-speed Internet. In addition to the pedagogical impact, there is also the revolution in the region: remote medical consultations will be possible, families will be able to communicate… [é] a chain effect.
The project faced “numerous” logistical challenges such as transporting the antennas to Manicoré (AM), which can only be accessed by river or air. Therefore, it was necessary to rent space on a ferry to transport the equipment to the city, from where the city hall sent the antennas to the schools by boat.
The hundred antennas were donated by the Polaris manned spaceflight program in partnership with Starlink. The benefited schools will have a paid high-speed connection for two years.
Without Starlink’s technology, Polaris’ financial support, MegaEdu’s articulation with the Education Departments and the structure of Grupo Datora, it would not have been possible. The level of technological quality delivered, at no cost to the user, has been revolutionary. We are looking for ways to expand this activity. We will visit schools to talk to secretariats, school boards and teachers. We want to closely monitor how these people’s lives will be impacted in the coming months.
Instituto Escola Conectada has been working since 2020 with several providers that have already brought high-speed internet to almost 70,000 students from more than 200 public schools in 18 cities in 8 Brazilian states. MegaEdu has already supported more than 5,000 schools to connect with a quality connection in 2022 alone.
Starlink is also responsible for connecting several of the aforementioned schools, including even a Yanomami indigenous reservation in February 2023 in partnership with the Federal Government.
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