Arkansas' schools were ranked No. 21 in the nation for broadband connectivity by EducationSuperHighway, a California-based nonprofit that has advised the state in the past.
But Evan Marwell, chief executive of the nonprofit, said Arkansas is on a path to rapidly climb in the rankings, which were released Thursday.
The state is in the midst of a $50 million project to connect students in the state to broadband at double the speed recommended by the Federal Communications Commission.
Only two states -- Hawaii and Wyoming -- boast 100 percent connectivity.
"Our nation is quickly moving toward a digitally based economy, and it is important to get Arkansas up to speed. That starts with our students," Gov. Asa Hutchinson said in a statement. "Our state plan ... is the first step in breaching the connectivity gap."
If the Arkansas Department of Information Systems project continues on schedule, the state would have close to 100 percent connectivity in two years.
Janet Wilson, spokesman for the Arkansas Department of Information Systems, said in an email that the department takes pride in the progress made since the first district was hooked up in July.
"However, our work will not be completed until all of the state's public and charter schools and education service cooperatives have been converted and are receiving the bandwidth needed for effective digital learning," she said.
In Arkansas, 79 percent of school districts are now meeting the FCC's 100 kbps per student goal for digital learning readiness, according to the EducationSuperHighway study. Kilobits, or 1,000 bits of data, transferred per second are referred to as kbps.
In August 2014, EducationSuperHighway said just 58 percent of the state's school districts were providing that speed.
In 2013, just 30 percent of school districts met the standard nationwide, Marwell said. Now, 77 percent do.
During a conference call with reporters, Marwell said Hutchinson provided key leadership on the issue.
"One of the first things that he did upon taking office was to focus on upgrading the Arkansas Public School Computer Network," he said. "Historically, that network had provided just 5 [kbps] per student, or one-twentieth of what the FCC said they needed to every district in the state. But after re-engineering the network and rebidding it out, the governor's team has managed to increase that by 40 times."
Every student -- outside of Woodlawn and Rison school districts in Cleveland County -- is scheduled to receive 200 kbps by 2017. No company bid on those districts during the request for proposals.
Wilson said the department plans to put out another request for bids early next year. If no company steps up to provide services for the Cleveland County districts, new FCC rules allow the state to step in and put fiber-optic cabling in the ground.
EducationSuperHighway ranked Arkansas poorly in broadband cost to schools, with just 4 percent of school districts meeting a $3/Mbps Internet access target. Megabits per second refers to 1 million bits of data transferred per second.
Before the upgrade, Wilson said schools were paying $11.50/Mbps for Internet from private companies. On the new network, schools will pay $3.50/Mbps.
The median cost nationwide is $11/Mbps.
Marwell said declining costs and increased support from the FCC has led to significant gains in broadband access across the nation.
"The pace of progress over the past two years have really been quite phenomenal," he said. "As with anything, there's always what you would might call low-hanging fruit and some of the easiest things to upgrade tend to happen first."
Still, he said he believed almost every school could receive sufficient broadband by the end of the decade.
"I'm very bullish on us being able to complete this mission," he said.
Hutchinson said faster Internet access in the classroom goes hand in hand with his computer-programming initiative.
"As a state, we are sending a strong message to businesses and entrepreneurs across the globe that Arkansas is committed to training up a generation of computer-literate young professionals," he said. "Every student in Arkansas deserves access to digital learning opportunities that develop critical skills they will need to compete in today's workforce."
Arkansas provides the upgrade status for each school district at 1.usa.gov/1I21QEt.
Metro on 11/20/2015