Comcast is expanding one of its lower-cost monthly plans to college students receiving Pell Grants.
The cable giant announced earlier this week that students receiving the federal funding will now qualify for its Internet Essentials offering, which costs about $10 a month for residents meeting a specific income threshold.
The Pell Grant expansion is part of Comcast’s Project Up, a $1 billion effort by the Philadelphia-based company to help 50 million people better connect and prosper digitally.
“Digital equity is key to success in education and economic mobility, now and into the future” said Broderick Johnson, Comcast’s executive vice president for public policy. “As our economic, medical, and educational systems become increasingly digital, it’s more important than ever that every American gets online.”
The company said 140,000 households have signed up for the Internet Essentials program in metro Atlanta since 2011 when the program launched. Metro Atlanta is in the Top 5 of Comcast’s markets to use Internet Essentials.
In Georgia, about 190,000 households have signed up for Internet Essentials, Comcast said.
Comcast also pledged to donate $15 million in Internet service and equipment, including more than 25,000 laptops, to low-income students, seniors and veterans.
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