| Abstract: | Abstract A small rural school in Idaho tried various forms of distance education to broaden the range of subjects offered to students. It gave up on satellite-based coursework because of high cost and synchronization problems. Correspondence courses solved the synchronization problem, but still required expensive adult supervision to keep students on task. IP-based videoconferencing appeared to promise lower costs and better synchronization, but in practice it proved to be difficult to implement and exhausting for course teachers. The school began to view videoconferencing in terms of its enrichment and collaboration values. The Internet, together with other distance education technologies, may one day erase the educational disadvantages of rural isolation. They also promise to make lifelong learning the expected norm. |
