Louisiana Announces About $18 Million in Digital Skills Awards: 11 Organizations to Receive More Than 25,000 Apple Devices
Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry and the Louisiana Office of Broadband Development and Connectivity, known as ConnectLA, announced on November 10, 2026, at the Louisiana Digital Skills and Technology Summit in Alexandria, Louisiana, that approximately $18 million in ÉTOUFFÉE awards had been finalized. Through a first-of-its-kind collaboration with Apple, 11 Louisiana organizations that provide adult education and workforce development will receive more than 25,000 Mac and iPad devices to make digital opportunities more accessible across the state.
ÉTOUFFÉE is a device distribution program administered by ConnectLA. Its name stands for Enhancing Technological Opportunity for yoU and your Family to Foster Education and Enterprise, and it is funded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Capital Projects Fund. ConnectLA is working with Apple, SHI, and the Louisiana Office of Technology Services to deliver the program.
The 11 recipients are the Bastion Veterans Wellness Center, Franklin Parish, the Louisiana Community and Technical College System, Pointe Coupée Parish, Savoy Medical, Southeastern Louisiana University, Southern University and A&M College, Southern University at New Orleans, the Town of St. Joseph, the Town of White Castle, and West Ascension Parish Hospital, spanning colleges, veterans service organizations, and rural health facilities.
The Louisiana Community and Technical College System will receive the largest award, about 13,000 devices. The system will also provide digital skills training so people can take classes, prepare for jobs, and access online services close to home.
Announcing the awards, Landry said the state is bringing high-speed internet to rural Louisiana and attracting new jobs across the state. For someone who has worked a full shift when the nearest class is a parish away, he said, having a computer and someone to show them how to use it can mean taking that class right at their kitchen table.
The awards form part of Louisiana's broader broadband buildout. The state has already launched large-scale fiber deployment, and ÉTOUFFÉE addresses the device and skills side: once the network reaches a home, residents still need a device they can use, and the skills to use it.
Source: Office of the Governor of Louisiana
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：位于 Baton Rouge 的路易斯安那州议会大厦。WClarke 摄，CC0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: The Louisiana State Capitol in Baton Rouge. Photo by WClarke, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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