*From Penn State University news releases / kw*
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*Penn State partner in statewide broadband project awarded $99 million*
Thursday, February 18, 2010
http://live.psu.edu/story/44666
University Park, Pa. - "More than $99 million in American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act funding was awarded today (Feb. 18) to the Keystone
Initiative for Network-Based Education and Research (KINBER). Penn State is
a founding member of KINBER, a coalition of Pennsylvania colleges and
universities, research and healthcare organizations and economic development
entities. The award will help fund the construction and management of the
Pennsylvania Research and Education Network (PennREN), a robust, statewide
broadband education and research network."
"This is a transformative endeavor for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and
for The Pennsylvania State University," said Penn State President Graham
Spanier. "Our faculty and students will benefit greatly from the research
and educational collaborations this network will spur. The network will also
bring much needed broadband capacity for distance education, economic
development and telemedicine, and will include areas of the Commonwealth
that have been underserved historically."
"PennREN will reach every region of the commonwealth, extending through 39
Pennsylvania counties, 22 of which currently are unserved or under-served
based on access to affordable broadband services. Through anchor
institutions like Penn State, the network has the potential to provide
services to more than 5 million individuals across 2 million households and
200,000 businesses. "
"When completed, all Penn State locations across the commonwealth will be
connected through PennREN. It is expected use of PennREN will allow for
significant cost avoidance for the University, while substantially
increasing network capability and capacity. For example, researchers at all
campuses will have the same high-speed capability to aid their research
projects; and the University will have more control over network capacity
allowing for longer term and more reliable network forecasting. "
"With 48 strands of optical fiber and a 1,700 miles long pathway, the
delivery capacity of this network for Penn State and it's 23 campuses is
enormous," said Kevin Morooney, Penn State Vice Provost for Information
Technology. "The commonwealth-wide, institutional collaboration to create
PennREN will provide each partner institution access to a network we'd
otherwise not be positioned to construct on our own, and will enhance Penn
State's ability to serve its land grant mission."
"The federal funds, supplemented with an additional $29 million in private
investment, were awarded through the American Recovery and Revitalization
Act by the NTIA, so PennREN will be created as a private/public partnership.
The construction of this network will allow additional optical fiber cable
to be available for commercial service providers to use.
In October, 15 members of Pennsylvania's Congressional delegation (Glenn
Thompson, Tim Holden, Jason Altmire, Robert Brady, Kathy Dahlkemper, Charles
Dent, Chaka Fattah, Jim Gerlach, Patrick Murphy, John Murtha, Joseph Pitts,
Todd Platts, Allyson Schwartz, Joe Sestak and Bill Shuster) and both of
Pennsylvania's senators (Robert Casey and Arlen Specter) wrote to the
Secretary of Commerce in support of the KINBER proposal. Their letters
stressed the educational, health care and economic benefits of the proposed
network."
"KINBER's founding members include the Association for Independent Colleges,
the University of Pennsylvania, Bucknell University, Carnegie Mellon
University, Drexel University, EINetworks, a collaboration of the Allegheny
Library Association and the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, the Hospital &
Health system Association of Pennsylvania, Lehigh University, the
Mid-Atlantic Gigapop for Internet 2 (MAGPI) at the University of
Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Commission for Community Colleges, the
Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education, The Pennsylvania State
University, Three Rivers Optical Exchange (3ROX), the University of
Pittsburgh, and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. "
"KINBER is an independent, non-profit corporation to ensure the needs of all
of the members and affiliates are addressed. The proposal to create PennREN
was endorsed by more than 25 state and regional organizations."
Contact
-
- Geoff Rushton <[log in to unmask]>
- 814-865-7517
- http://live.psu.edu
- --------------------------------------------------------------------
- Karen Weaver, MLS, Adjunct Faculty, Cataloging & Classification, The
iSchool at Drexel University, College of Information Science &
Technology,
Philadelphia PA email: [log in to unmask] / Electronic
Resources Statistician, Duquesne University, Gumberg Library,
Pittsburgh PA
email: [log in to unmask]
"It may well be that the greatest tragedy of this period of social
transition is not the glaring noisiness of the so-called bad people, but the
appalling silence of the so-called good people." --Martin Luther King Jr.,
1929-1968
