Giga – Connecting Every School to the Internet

With the goal of making school connectivity universal and meaningful, ITU and UNICEF launched Giga in 2019: an initiative to connect all the schools in the world to the internet and every young person to information, opportunity and choice.   

More than 1 billion children struggle to learn without quality (fixed) broadband access to the Internet at home, and only around half of the world’s schools are online. This digital exclusion particularly affects the poorest communities, girls and those with disabilities; causing learners to miss out on digital resources and services, the option to learn remotely (e.g. during pandemics or instability), and the opportunity to develop digital skills. UNICEF and ITU have therefore joined forces to create Giga, an initiative to connect every school in the world to the Internet and address this new form of inequality. 
 

Giga also uses schools as anchor points for their surrounding communities: if you enable connectivity for the school, you can open a path to connecting local businesses and services. This addresses some of the key challenges for Internet service providers to deploy infrastructure in hard to connect areas. Giga’s work in laying the tracks for connectivity is only one part of a wider effort to bridge the digital divide. Giga therefore works with a range of initiatives in UNICEF, ITU and beyond to ensure that students and teachers can access the skills, devices and content they need to make full use of connectivity. 
 
The Giga initiative consists of three pillars: Map, Model, and Contract. 

• ​Map the location of schools and monitor school connectivity status in real-time 
• Model the infrastructure, policies, regulations, and investments needed to deliver school connectivity 
• Help governments to contract connectivity for schools 

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