Schools.connected

Tackling the digital divide is hugely important to Vodafone, who responded to the crisis families were facing with home-school and lack of access to online learning by launching schools.connected. Through this programme, Vodafone sent 350,000 free sims [with 30GB data allowance, valid for 3 months, to schools nationwide who ordered them on Vodafone’s portal. Vodafone recognises that teachers know their students the best and which ones need help connecting to studies remotely, so allowing teachers to distribute the sims worked perfectly. Launched within weeks, during lockdown #2, the first 250k sims Vodafone released were ordered nationwide within 4 days. Vodafone were subsequently able to release another 100k sims and expand the programme to further education colleges. In all, over 9,100 primary, secondary schools and colleges have benefitted from schools.connected.