With the introduction of orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) technology to communication channels in a cable network, cable modems that receive data downstream over subcarriers of the OFDM channel are grouped into modulation tiers based on at least one metric. Modulation tiers are generated at a subcarrier group level such that network elements can use different profile tiers depending in the subcarrier group in use. A scheduler facilitates the scheduling of modulation tiers for network element destination groups across subcarrier groups, where the modulation tier for a network element may vary between subcarrier groups. The scheduler also facilitates scheduling multiple network element destination groups for transmission of a plurality of subcarrier groups for optimal transmission to the network elements.