The “quickest and certainly the most cost effective way” to expand and increase connectivity to America’s schools and libraries “is by leveraging the extensive networks of commercial service providers,” CenturyLink told FCC officials Monday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1fLPqVP). The telco was meeting with agency officials to discuss the planned expansion of the E-rate program. “The Commission should not underestimate, as many parties have, the impressively broad reach of the fiber networks of proven commercial providers.” Public networks, in contrast, have “a poor record for cost-effectiveness and reliability, and self-provisioning of high-bandwidth facilities is invariably ill-advised,” the ILEC said. The “vast majority” of schools and libraries “have Ethernet available today,” and CenturyLink can deliver 100 Mbps or higher service quickly and cost effectively “simply by installing a fiber loop to the school or library building,” it said.

USTelecom and some of its member telcos met with FCC Wireline Bureau officials Feb. 20 to discuss eligible telecom carrier status as the FCC implements Connect America Fund Phase II in territories served by price cap carriers, said an ex parte filing posted Thursday (http://bit.ly/1fLO4KK). The ILECs discussed how to ensure obligations and funding are “appropriately matched” while avoiding consumer disruption. The groups discussed “how this can be achieved with the coming charge from very broad geographic support under legacy programs to the CAF II program’s targeting of universal service support to very narrow, discrete geographic areas for specifically defined services,” the filing said, without going into further detail.

The FCC can encourage smart and efficient use of bandwidth in schools and libraries by modernizing the eligible services list, said representatives from Microsoft and its law firm at a Feb. 20 meeting with commission staff. The representatives said the FCC could better protect student privacy in the digital age, and promote the deployment and use of low-cost, high-quality connections. The positions are described in a Microsoft policy paper, “Empowering America’s Students” (http://bit.ly/1bMeEnE). FCC officials at the meeting were from the Wireline Bureau and Office of Strategic Planning, said a Microsoft ex parte filing posted to docket 13-184 Tuesday (http://bit.ly/1hgHKLA).

The FCC clarified that its IP Captioned Telephone Service rule remains in effect, requiring providers to get third-party professional certification from new IP CTS users who pay less than $75 for equipment. In a public notice Monday (http://bit.ly/1bJnl1P), the Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau said the interim rule remains in effect until the Office of Management and Budget approves the information collections contained in the final rule, which hasn’t happened yet.

The FCC needs to act quickly to cease use of the “unpredictable and opaque quantile regression analysis-based caps that have chilled lending and investment” to rural rate-of-return regulated LECs, NTCA told aides to all commissioners except the chairman Thursday and Friday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1k7BN6J). It said such action would be “consistent with the statements of Chairman [Tom] Wheeler,” who has said he would end use of the quantile regression analysis (CD Dec 18 p2). NTCA also encouraged the commission to address the “flash-cut elimination” of Safety Net Additive support to companies that qualified based upon investments made in 2010 and 2011.

The FCC Wireline Bureau dismissed four petitions for waiver of various high-cost universal service filing deadlines, in a public notice Monday (http://bit.ly/1bJoy9t). Hayneville Fiber Transport, Hargray Telephone Co., Pine Belt Telephone Co. and Telenational Communications had their petitions dismissed as part of the FCC’s “ongoing effort to manage its dockets and reduce backlog,” the notice said, because none of the petitions came forward in response to an earlier notice asking if they are still interested in pursuing their petitions.

FCC Commissioner Mignon Clyburn plans to work with the healthcare sector “to research, review and recommend how our current and evolving communications infrastructure can more efficiently and effectively solve basic health challenges and disparities,” she told the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society pre-conference symposium in Orlando on Sunday, according to prepared remarks (http://fcc.us/MpmUh7). Clyburn’s office will take the lead on coordinating the effort, she said, which will seek “to leverage the human and technical resources we have at the FCC to address health care disconnects in our society.” The initiative, details of which will be released in the coming days, will complement the FCC’s existing work assisting rural healthcare organizations in utilizing “the ever growing promise of health IT,” she said.

Vonage asked the FCC for another extension to satisfy the agency’s rule banning fake ringing tones. “Due to the inability to leverage its existing system to meet the requirements of the Rule, Vonage is building a new system to play a message to customers in situations where a ring is not received from an intermediate carrier,” Vonage said in a petition filed Friday (http://bit.ly/1bGLar5). The FCC had granted Vonage’s initial waiver request by extending the rule to March 3; Vonage needs until April 2 to comply, it said.

The FCC’s E-rate reforms should recognize that digital learning not only requires a broadband connection to each school, but also the infrastructure within the school that can deliver the bandwidth and technology that meet each classroom’s needs, Comcast told agency officials Tuesday, an ex parte filing said (http://bit.ly/1miTRcv). The majority of connections to that infrastructure likely will be through Wi-Fi enabled devices, and as a result, Wi-Fi will be an “important component of delivering broadband access to classrooms,” Comcast said. The ISP expressed its “firm belief” that broadband Internet connectivity at school “must be complemented by broadband access at home if Americans are to gain the full educational benefits of the Internet.” Comcast touted its Internet Essentials program, which provides low-cost access to low-income Americans at home, “most for the very first time."

Frontier Communications received notice from the FTC of the early termination of the required antitrust waiting period under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, it said in a news release Thursday (http://bit.ly/1c9mzpL). The expiration of the waiting period satisfies one of the conditions of the completion of the Frontier’s proposed buy of AT&T’s wireline assets in Connecticut, the telco said. The FCC and state regulator still have to approve the transaction, which was announced in December.