The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced that it has received more than 700 applications seeking $6.5 billion in funding for digital equity projects. NTIA noted that the total requested amount of funding is more than six times the available amount from the first round of the Digital Equity Act’s Competitive Grant Program funding. 

The Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) Privacy and Data Protection Task Force has announced partnerships with five new state attorneys general to improve investigations into data privacy and security.

The Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) is modernizing and upgrading internet connectivity within Kentucky’s 171 school districts, the Kentucky School for the Deaf, the Kentucky School for the Blind, Kentucky’s 50 area technology centers, and the KDE office in Frankfort.

The University of Georgia (UGA) has received a five-year, $10 million grant from the Institute of Education Sciences that will be used to establish a research and development center with the goal of providing national leadership on best practices for using generative AI (GenAI) in schools.

Northern New Mexico College (NNMC) has established a new center for IT and cybersecurity that will offer cybersecurity training and provide students with the skills needed to enter the cybersecurity field.

Researchers at the University of Georgia (UGA) have found that virtual reality (VR) technology may help multilingual students better retain information.

The Montana Fish, Wildlife, and Parks (FWP) has unveiled a new online tool that provides the general public with up-to-date information on known grizzly bear mortalities across the state.

The Maryland Department of Information Technology (DoIT) announced that “white hat” hackers found more than 40 exploitable vulnerabilities in the state’s first-ever bug bounty program.

The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) has finalized a drone use plan that authorizes staff to conduct pinniped (also known as seals) research and management surveys in the state’s coastal and inland waters.

California has unveiled new dashboards that help Californians track the state’s wildfire prevention work.