School of Information Sciences

Community Data Clinic receives Broadband READY grant

Anita Say Chan
Anita Say Chan, Professor

The Community Data Clinic, a mixed methods data studies and interdisciplinary community research lab led by Associate Professor Anita Say Chan, has received a $50,000 grant to address gaps in household access to computing devices, hotspot connectivity, and digital literacy skills in East Central Illinois. The grant is part of the state's Broadband Regional Engagement for Adoption and Digital Equity (READY) program, which is operated through the governor's office and Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity. The Community Data Clinic at the University of Illinois is one of only four sites that are partnering with the state on this effort.

"Our award centers UIUC's leadership in helping the state to expand civic infrastructures and ensure equity in access for Illinois' diverse populations," said Chan, who is a principal investigator on the grant along with Tracy Smith, director of research IT and innovation at Illinois.

According to the researchers, data from the United Way show that from 2007 to 2017, the cost of a basic family survival budget grew by 38%, "driven largely by increases in the costs of housing, health care, and childcare, but also by the addition of basic smartphone plans and internet connections to budgets." The COVID-19 pandemic put an additional strain on these already vulnerable households.

Over the next year, the clinic will collaborate with the Champaign County Housing Authority and Project Success of Vermillion County, an after-school program that partners with nearly twenty schools in the county. Kimberly David, associate director of Project Success, notes that the lack of available resources in households—including access to laptops and reliable, affordable internet connection—heavily influenced students' absenteeism during quarantine, and that the impact could remain even after COVID subsides.

"Working together, we aim to elevate and expand best practices and approaches to engage local stakeholders toward shared goals in broadband access, adoption, and healthy practices in utilization," said Chan. According to Chan, next steps include a deployment of two hundred laptops for low-income households in early August, in partnership with local community groups.

In addition to directing the Community Data Clinic at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), Chan co-leads the Just Infrastructures Initiative with faculty in the Grainger College of Engineering. She is a Fiddler Innovation Faculty Fellow at the NCSA and a 2020-2021 Faculty Affiliate at the Data & Society Research Institute in New York City. She received her PhD from MIT in the history and anthropology of science and technology studies.

Updated on
Backto the news archive

Related News

Olalere receives HSLI Jira Scholarship

Precious Olalere, a doctoral student in information sciences, has been awarded the 2025 Helen Knoll Jira Scholarship from the Health Science Librarians of Illinois (HSLI). This award supports individuals pursuing education in library or information science in Illinois, especially those focusing on health science librarianship.

Precious Olalere

iSchool researchers present at ILA 2025

School faculty, staff, and students will present their research at the 2025 Illinois Library Association (ILA) Annual Conference, which will be held on October 14–16 in Rosemont. The theme of this year's conference is "You Belong Here."

Craig named Illinois Library Luminary

Anne Craig, iSchool adjunct lecturer and senior director of the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI), has been inducted as an Illinois Library Luminary. The Illinois Library Luminary program, an initiative of the Illinois Library Association (ILA), recognizes those who have made a significant contribution to Illinois libraries.

Anne Craig

Library Trends examines genre classifications in latest issue

The iSchool at Illinois is pleased to announce the publication of Library Trends 74 (1), titled “Genres and Their Uses in Cultural Documentation: Exploring Generic Access to Creative Worlds.” Pushing back against the notion of genres as “inferior” classifications due to their ambiguity, this issue instead explores how genre classifications facilitate access to creative works in libraries and beyond.

Cover of Library Trends 74 (1)

iSchool researchers present at CSCW 2025

Several faculty, students, and recent grads will present their research at the 28th ACM Conference on Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing (CSCW 2025), which will be held October 18–22 in Bergen, Norway. The online portion of the conference will be held on October 10. 

School of Information Sciences

501 E. Daniel St.

MC-493

Champaign, IL

61820-6211

Voice: (217) 333-3280

Fax: (217) 244-3302

Email: ischool@illinois.edu

Back to top