The Digital Divide-A New Understanding

I found our learning about the digital divide to be very eye opening. One of the other threads in our presentation quoted: "Access is not the dividing line in technology". I thought this really summed up what the new digital divide really is addressing.  The lightbulb moment for me is that it makes sense that there is a new kind of digital divide outside of just having acces to the internet, but that I assumed that everyone was utilizing it to the same degree. This feels very similiar to other assumptions that society and educators have made about our learners of today. Not everyone can just hop online and fill out a job application. There are many minorities out there that just have internet access through their cell phones and are not capable of accessing many resources that broadband internet access provides.  Sara Hertz does a great job explaining this using the terms "entertainment vs. empowerment:.

Hertz, M. B. (n.d.).  A new understanding of the digital divide| Edutopia. K-12 Education & Learning Innovations with Proven Strategies that Work | Edutopia. Retrieved January 6, 2012 http://www.edutopia.org/blog/digital-divide-technology-internet-access-mary-beth-hertz

When I was teaching in the Indianapolis Public School System, it was difficult to grasp the "have and have nots" of my students' daily life even down to the simplest amenities such as a coat and gloves. Becoming more educated on the digital divide felt the same way. I, myself, had misconceptions about the internet accessibility across different cultural groups. This was such a good reality check about how technological access to resources provides many more opportunites than I had realized.

Watching the class presentation on the New Digital Divide, https://voicethread.com/share/3225021/,
 I felt that many of the other threads addressed the misconceptions of the new digitial divide. I am wondering if other people had experienced this same kind of  "aha" moment that I had about my assumptions and this is why the chose to address the misconceptions.
I also thought the thread did a gret job of addressing how important it is for educators to know that students may have limited knowledge about how to use the internet for personal growth due to their experience with the internet as just being for entertainment purposes. Educators need to teach their students how to productively use their internet.