Elon Musk Wants to Give Internet Access to Students on School Buses The billionaire's latest filing with the FCC aims to bring internet access to even the most remote routes.
By Emily Rella
As Elon Musk continues to attempt to infiltrate as many industries as possible, his latest endeavors with internet company Starlink are showing just how far Musk is willing to go.
Musk has announced that his Starlink internet service provider will soon be instated in Iran after the U.S. announced that it was lifting sanctions in the country where strict censorship policies have limited secure access to the Internet.
"Activating Starlink …,' Musk wrote on Twitter in response to a statement by Secretary of State Anthony Blinken.
The news comes after Musk's announcement on September 18 that Starlink was officially active on all continents, even Antarctica.
Following Musk's announcement of Starlink's Iranian endeavor, he shared that the internet provider will also be available for usage on school buses in the U.S., per a new FCC filing.
"The overwhelming majority of the participating students will not have access to high-speed broadband at home," the document reads. "Connecting school buses will afford students the ability to optimize their commute time for necessary educational internet use, as well as time spent with family and friends or recreational activities."
The services will be targeted toward bus rides that are over 60 minutes in each direction on routes in rural parts of the country where other internet services are "predominantly inaccessible."
The FCC has long made a push for Wi-FI to be accessible on school buses, with over $35 million from the agency's Emergency Connectivity Fund (which was started as a part of the COVID-19 relief plan) having been put towards Wi-Fi hotspots and services for buses since May.
It's been a big year of expansion for Starlink which announced last month that it would be expanding to Royal Caribbean cruise ships worldwide.
The internet service provider also broke the news of a partnership with T-Mobile which will "provide near complete coverage in most places in the US — even in many of the most remote locations previously unreachable by traditional cell signals."
Starlink is a subsidiary of Musk's Space X.
