Selected Comparisons with Public Schools

Highlights

• In 1998-99, private schools continued to be outpaced by public schools on some indicators of the availability of advanced telecommunications. Compared with public schools, private schools reported more students per instructional computer with Internet access; private schools were less likely to be connected to the Internet, and they reported proportionately fewer instructional rooms with Internet access.
• Nevertheless, private schools have made some substantial gains since 1995, some comparable to public schools. Between fall 1995 and 1998-99, the percentage point increase in private schools with Internet access was comparable to the gains made by public schools.

NCES has conducted annual surveys of advanced telecommunications in public schools since 1994. Although the public and private school surveys were designed to permit some comparisons across school sector and over time, the public school questionnaire was substantially shorter than the private school survey, and some of the items have changed over time to better reflect recent developments in advanced telecommunications. Therefore, only a limited number of comparisons can be made. The focus of this chapter is on private-public comparisons of selected issues: availability of computers, Internet access in schools and instructional rooms, types of Internet connection, and the availability and use of Internet capabilities (email and the World Wide Web).

Prevalence of Computers

In the 1998-99 school year, the ratio of private school students per instructional computer was 8 to 1 compared with the public school ratio of 6 to 1 in fall 1998 (figure 13). Differences between private and public schools also exist in the availability of instructional computers with Internet access. Whereas private schools had 15 students per instructional computer with Internet access for the 1998-99 school year, public schools reported a ratio of 12 to 1 in fall 1998.

Among public schools, elementary and secondary schools report similar ratios of students per instructional computer (six students; table B-38). This pattern is not consistent across private schools; that is, it holds for Catholic schools but not for other religious and nonsectarian schools. For example, among other religious schools, secondary schools report fewer students per instructional computer (six) than elementary schools (nine).

Internet Access in Schools

Overall, private schools were less likely than public schools to be connected to the Internet during the 1998-99 school year (figure 14). Sixty-seven percent of private schools compared with 89 percent of public schools were connected to the Internet. Private schools were also less likely than public schools to report Internet access in fall 1995; 25 percent of private schools compared with 50 percent of public schools had Internet access at that time.

Increases in the proportion of schools with Internet access since 1995 were similar for private and public schools (figure 14). The proportion of private schools with Internet access increased from 25 percent in fall 1995 to 67 percent in the 1998-99 school year. Among public schools, the proportion of schools with Internet access increased from 50 percent in fall 1995 to 89 percent in fall 1998. These data suggest that private schools have made similar progress to public schools in gaining access to the Internet within the past 4 years, although private schools continue to be less likely than their public school counterparts to be connected to the Internet.

Internet Access in Instructional Rooms

School-level measures of Internet access do not provide a clear indication of the extent to which those telecommunications capabilities are available in instructional rooms or classrooms.

In the 1998-99 school year, private schools had fewer of their instructional rooms connected to the Internet compared with the percentage of instructional rooms with Internet access in public schools in fall 1998 (figure 15). Twenty five percent of private school instructional rooms were connected to the Internet compared with 51 percent for public schools.

Compared to public schools, private schools had lower rates of increase in the proportion of instructional rooms with Internet access since 1995 (figure 15). Whereas the proportion of instructional rooms with Internet access in private schools increased from 5 percent in fall 1995 to 25 percent in the 1998-99 school year, the proportion of public school instructional rooms with Internet access increased from 9 percent in fall 1995 to 51 percent in fall 1998. Between fall 1995 and 1998, the proportion of public school instructional rooms with Internet access increased sharply from 27 to 51 percent.

Increases in the proportion of schools with Internet access since 1995 were similar for private and public schools (figure 14). The proportion of private schools with Internet access increased from 25 percent in fall 1995 to 67 percent in the 1998-99 school year. Among public schools, the proportion of schools with Internet access increased from 50 percent in fall 1995 to 89 percent in fall 1998. These data suggest that private schools have made similar progress to public schools in gaining access to the Internet within the past 4 years, although private schools continue to be less likely than their public school counterparts to be connected to the Internet.

Connections to the Internet

The two main types of connections examined in the private and public school surveys were dialup connections and relatively faster connections using dedicated lines. Overall, private schools were considerably less likely than public schools to connect to the Internet using dedicated lines (figure 16). In 1998, 21 percent of private schools compared with 65 percent of public schools connected to the Internet used dedicated lines. In contrast, private schools were considerably more likely than public schools to use dial-up connections (65 versus 22 percent). ¹⁴

Availability of the World Wide Web

Differences in the availability of advanced telecommunications between private and public schools can also be examined in terms of the extent to which the World Wide Web (WWW) was available to students and teachers. In 1998, private schools were less likely than public schools to report that the WWW was available to students (71 versus 92 percent, figure 17). They were also less likely to report the availability of the WWW to teachers (84 versus 97 percent, figure 18).

The proportion of private schools making the WWW available to students did not change significantly since 1995 (figure 17). In contrast, there was a significant increase in the proportion of public schools reporting the availability of the WWW to students, from 70 percent in fall 1995 to 92 percent in fall 1998. This increase holds when the availability of the WWW to teachers in public schools was examined (figure 18).

Extent of Use of the World Wide Web and E-mail

A final comparison between private and public schools is in the extent to which teachers and students use the World Wide Web (figure 19). In 1998, there were no significant differences in the proportion of private and public schools reporting that teachers use the WWW to "a large extent." For example, 24 percent of private schools and 26 percent of public schools reported that teachers used the WWW to a large extent. Similarly, private and public schools did not differ in the extent to which students use these Internet capabilities to a large extent (31 and 26 percent, respectively).

The proportion of private schools reporting that teachers or students used e-mail to a large extent did not differ significantly from public schools (figure 19). However, there was a difference in the student-teacher comparison of e-mail use in public schools, with teachers more likely than students to use e-mail to a large extent (32 versus 10 percent). This student-teacher difference was not statistically significant for private schools.

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