Your 2026 to 2030 equipment budget, explained
How the five-year Category Two budget is calculated, what it covers, and how to avoid losing it.
Category Two is the part of E-rate that pays for the network inside your buildings: Wi-Fi access points, switches, routers, cabling, firewalls, and their installation and basic maintenance. Unlike internet service, which is funded year by year, Category Two comes as a fixed budget for five years.
How the budget is set
- Schools: $201.57 per full-time student for 2026 to 2030, up 20.7% from the last cycle.
- Libraries: $5.43 per square foot.
- A minimum of $30,175 per school or library.
- Districts are budgeted district-wide and can spend across buildings.
That figure is your budget before the discount. E-rate pays your Category Two discount share of it, capped at 85%, and you pay the rest. A 2,000-student district at an 80% discount has a $403,140 budget, of which E-rate would pay $322,512.
The lock
Student counts are validated the first year you request equipment, and the budget is then fixed for the cycle. If your enrollment is growing, the year you first file matters.
How budgets get lost
Most unused budget is never requested at all. Nobody files, the five years pass, and the money expires. The other common loss is approved equipment money that is never invoiced before its deadline. Both are avoidable with a calendar and someone watching it.
Any school, district or library: what was approved, paid, left unspent and still unclaimed.