The Schools and Libraries Division announced February 8 that this week it will be distributing another 321 letters, totaling $32.7 million worth of funding commitments, for the 2004 E-rate funding year. The latest wave, number 13, will raise the total committed for 2004 slightly, to more than $1.7 billion. The SLD is authorized to commit up to $2.4 billion for the current funding year.
There was no change in the threshold for approved internal connections requests, which remains at 81 percent.
Applicants who do not know the outcome of their 2004 funding requests and wish to seek funding for the same projects on their applications for 2005 are supposed to indicate on their applications that a similar funding request is pending on another application, and provide the number of that request. It is expected that the SLD will work with applicants during application review to determine which request will be maintained, based on future approvals.
In recent years, the SLD has held up approving new requests in mid-February in order to give applicants the advantage of additional installation time. Under Federal Communications Commission rules, applicants whose funding commitments for non-recurring services are not approved until on or after March 1, 2005 automatically will have until September 30, 2006 to make use of those commitments.
Further details on the wave will be made available later this week.
