USAC’s Schools and Libraries News Brief of November 9, 2018 provides a brief overview of USAC’s Open Data platform, a collection of datasets, updated daily, providing detailed data derived from applicant Form 470s, Form 471s, and other EPC information. The entire platform can be accessed via USAC’s Tools page.

In addition to the new “E-rate Recipient Details and Commitments” dataset referenced above, the Open Data platform contains databases breaking out and/or integrating data from multiple USAC data sources from FY 2016 forward (including early Form 470 data for FY 2019). The datasets include:
- Competitive bidding data including:
- Basic Form 470 information
- Consortium entity information
- Form 470 consultant information
- Funding request data including:
- Basic Form 471 information
- The new “E-rate Recipient Details and Commitments” dataset
- Form 471 consultant information
- Discount rate data
- Requested services by line item
- FRN status
- Recipients of service
- Supplemental EPC information on:
As the News Brief notes, the Open Data platform gives users the ability to view, search, filter, manipulate, and extract program data in a variety of formats (including API). By setting up accounts within Open Data, users can save customized searches to view automatically updated information in one action instead of having to download and reformat data from multiple datasets.
Open Data video guides are available to help users:
- Sort a dataset
- Search within a dataset
- Comment on a dataset
- Use basic filters
- Create a map
- Use data “lens”
- Aggregate data
USAC’s News Brief also provides an update on November’s upcoming training sessions.