As Ontario shifted from classroom to online learning due to COVID-19, a deficit revealed itself: some rural communities have insufficient internet access.

U of G’s Prof. Helen Hambly Odame, School of Environmental Design and Rural Development, is quoted in a recent London Free Press story that explores the inequality in internet access in southern Ontario. School boards are pushing to remedy the situation. 

“It is an equity issue from the perspective of a digital divide between urban and rural,” said Hambly Odame in the article. “We do see significant and substantial variation across a region like Southwestern Ontario.”

The internet is critical infrastructure and there is a need to be proactive to ensure equal access in the future, she added.

Hambly Odame has designed and implemented research on a wide range of communication, media and intellectual asset projects in agriculture.