“Access to computers and the Internet has become a basic need for education in our society.”
– Kent Conrad, former U.S. Senator
The Digital Divide, a concept which defines the factors and impacts of equitable digital access (Lythreatis, 2022), is something I became familiar with during previous research into digital learning environments.
My Connection to the Digital Divide
I did not realize the Digital Divide’s impact until I began examining how unequal access to technology affects education, information access, and digital literacy. This issue hit home as I watched my parents experience these challenges first hand. Their struggles weren’t about owning devices but instead related to not having reliable internet access in rural Nova Scotia; their delay in adopting personnel computers combined with unreliable internet access limited their ability to access information and online tools to make life easier, such as like government programs, online shopping and or quality of life capabilities such as social media and sharing photos with their kids and or grandchildren. Their home, in 2025, still has only 1 Mbps of internet speed, costing over $80 CAD per month. I’ve tested this speed and made numerous attempts to improve it through the internet service provider, despite their advertising speeds of up to 300 Mbps.
What Does “Access” Really Mean?
While reports suggest that over 94% of Canadians have access to the internet and hardware (Statista, 2004), gut instincts tell me this is a binary data point: either you have access or you don’t; if this assumption is correct, it fails to capture the nuances of access. Factors like low bandwidth, discrepancies between advertised speed and reality, data limits, affordability, and hardware reliability may all impact someone’s actual level of access. When these attributes are ignored, it can create the misguided perspective that the problem is nearly solved, potentially discouraging further investment in digital inclusion. My inquiry seeks to unpack these statistics and uncover the reality of digital access in Canada beyond binary data. While initial findings demonstrate high access levels, these figures don’t reflect the realities I have experienced. I aim to explore how this data may obscure ongoing inequities, specifically how limited or low-quality access hinders students’ ability to engage with digital learning tools.
As part of our Inquiry-Based Learning (IBL) project, my team selected The Digital Divide course (Goodwill Industries International, n.d.), offered through Coursera. Coursera’s global reach and accessibility make it an ideal platform for testing digital learning experiences. The course addresses digital equity’s core issues, including root causes, community impacts, and potential solutions.
Simulating Limited Access
To simulate the experience of low-speed access, I completed the course while emulating a 3G connection (~3Mbps). The challenges were immediate: login issues, delayed slide loads, and persistent video buffering made basic navigation frustrating. Videos, the main media used in this course, were only watchable at the lowest resolution (240p), with blurry on-screen text and playback speed tools becoming unusable. These issues highlight how limited access can impact digital learning, which is already challenging and, when made more difficult, may lead to higher student drop-off rates.
This hands-on simulation highlights that digital access should not be measured as a yes or no question; it’s about how and to what extent someone can access information. As I continue developing this inquiry, I welcome input on the following:
- How can we more accurately measure digital access in Canada?
- What other factors contribute to persistent digital divide, even in “connected” communities?
References
Conrad, K. (n.d.). Access to computers and the Internet has become a basic need for education in our society. BrainyQuote. https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/kent_conrad_168841
Goodwill Industries International. (n.d.). The Digital Divide. [MOOC]. Coursera. https://www.coursera.org/learn/the-digital-divide
Lythreatis, S., Singh, S. K., & El-Kassar, A.-N. (2022). The digital divide: A review and future research agenda. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 175, Article 121359. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2021.121359
OpenAI. (2025). Frustrated man switches to book after slow internet connection. https://chat.openai.com/
Statista. (2024). Number of internet users in Canada 2013–2024. https://www.statista.com/statistics/243808/number-of-internet-users-in-canada
I am excited to follow your exploration into this issue. How are these access statistics measured? And how honest are those figures? Benjamin Disraeli is credited with having said, “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” Your simple bandwidth-throttling demonstration suggests that these statistics are clearly more nuanced than a binary value. There is more of a story to uncover.
I’ve been designing and building on the web since the mid-90s, when payload size and bandwidth were real constraints that required constant consideration. As access has improved, as well as bandwidth and download speeds, there has been a huge shift in how web properties are built. There is now much less concern of optimised design approaches, as there seems to be an assumption that it’s simply up to the internet to deliver whatever is there. This is despite data that still shows that users abandon a slow-loading website after only about three seconds (Red Website Design, 2023; Tenacity, 2024).
As internet speeds have improved, so have video formats; however, the latter comes with a cost. Users are being conditioned to expect high-quality, high-definition videos that are available on demand. As you have demonstrated, that creates a big challenge in the context of online courses and the digital divide. Is there a middle-ground that can fulfill the needs of everyone? Or does the lowest-common denominator just keep shifting upward?
References
Red Website Design. (2023, October 6). Why You Are Losing 57% of Your Website Visitors Within 3 Seconds. Retrieved from https://red-website-design.co.uk/why-you-are-losing-57-of-your-website-visitors-within-3-seconds/
Tenacity. (2024, October 26). Why 53% of Mobile Visits Are Abandoned Over Slow Load Times. Retrieved from https://tenacity.io/facts/53-percent-of-mobile-site-visits-are-abandoned-due-to-slow-load-times/
Hey Allie,
Thanks so much for this insightful post, I really appreciated how you connected the concept of the Digital Divide to your personal experience. The story about your parents in rural Nova Scotia really brought the issue to life in a way that stats alone never could. It also reminded me that “access” isn’t just about having a device or connection, it’s about how usable and reliable that access really is.
Your idea of simulating a 3G connection to experience limited access firsthand was honestly brilliant. It added so much weight to your reflections on digital learning. It made me wonder: how many online courses or platforms actually consider low-bandwidth users in their design? I’ve had frustrations with buffering too, even in urban areas, so I can only imagine how frustrating it must be when 240p is your only option.
I also really liked the questions you posed at the end, they opened up the conversation in a meaningful way. In particular, the idea that national statistics might oversimplify digital access got me thinking: What kinds of metrics would capture access quality better? Maybe something like average actual speed vs. advertised speed, or average time to complete a basic online task?
Thanks again for sharing your perspective, it really helped me think more critically about what “digital equity” means in practice.
Looking forward to seeing where your inquiry takes you!
Alex
Hi Allie,
Your reflection really resonated with me — especially your point about access being more than just a binary measure. The experience with your parents is such a powerful reminder that “having internet” doesn’t necessarily mean having meaningful access. Your simulation of low-speed connectivity made that even more tangible.
It reminded me of Selwyn’s (2010) argument that educational technology often gets framed around potential rather than actual lived experience. Your inquiry is a great example of why we need to look beyond the surface of stats and ask what kind of access, for whom, and at what cost?
Looking forward to seeing where your research takes you!
Selwyn, N. (2010). Looking beyond learning: Notes towards the critical study of educational technology. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 26(1), 65–73. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2729.2009.00338.x
Hi Allie,
Thanks for sharing this post and your experiences (and that of your family). As someone who sometimes lives in a rural location, I recognise keenly the disparity in internet provision, and that simple statistics about who has and doesn’t have access masks a more complex story that goes beyond infrastructure provision into issues of cost. I use a UK data plan on my cellphone here in Canada because it’s cheaper to buy a UK plan with international roaming than to buy a Canadian plan!
As you rightly point out, without more nuanced data, decisions are being made about how platforms and learning experiences are developed and delivered that de-prioritise inclusion. As Marion says above, edtech is so often dealing in the potential experience of learners, not the actual. Since the promise of many MOOC platforms was to open up access to learning there is something important in here to consider about who the imagined audience for this Coursera course is and who the *actual* audience is. You might find this paper about digital imaginaries and rural education interesting reading in terms of pushing deeper into the impacts that data has on policy and the kinds of visions for education that are set up by that:
Ruiz N., Gallagher, M. Rural education imaginaries in digital education policy: an analysis of CONPES 3988 in Colombia, International Journal of Educational Development,
Volume 113, 2025, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijedudev.2025.103222.