Cox is expanding its Connect2Compete offering through 2016, and...

School Lunch program, it said. C2C, which launched last year, began as a partnership with Cox, FCC, NCTA and others in the cable industry, Cox CEO Patrick Esser said Tuesday at the National Press Club. The program can help close the “homework gap,” said FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel. Getting homework done at home takes connecting at home, she said. C2C is important and Cox is “making a big difference in the 18 states where they provide broadband service,” she said. Seven out of 10 teachers assign homework that requires some form of Internet access, she said. FCC and industry must close the gap and “make sure that no child in the 21st century is left off line,” she said. With Connect2Compete, many more students can do their homework, and the service “can mean that their families, too, can participate more fully in a digital world and in modern civic and commercial life,” she said. Rosenworcel also highlighted the FCC’s effort to upgrade the E-rate program and action to begin an initiative to make Wi-Fi more widely available in schools and libraries. Cox and its partners have the power and responsibility “to empower learning beyond the walls of the school,” said Esser. Cox also has a partnership with the Boys and Girls Club of America, he said: Cox has invested in and built “more than 70 Cox technology centers in clubhouses throughout the country.” The program needs more partners to help step up its offering, said Zach Leverenz, EveryoneOn CEO. He urged other companies to “get behind Cox” and push forward toward an “opportunity-to-access provided for every single student.” Connect2Compete is the flagship program at EveryoneOn for K-12 students, Cox said in a news release.