Introduction Northeastern New Mexico is rural, relatively poor, and predominantly Hispanic - not the kind of place the 'information superhighway' naturally travels through. Yet it is exactly the type of place it should be reaching - to bring equal educational and economic opportunities to all parts of the country. This region exemplifies the more rural parts of the United States in that its schools are somewhat isolated from the larger educational centers and while its families are used to hard work, historically they have not placed great emphasis on education. The school systems are adequate but a relatively small percentage of the graduates go on to college and an even smaller number go on to study in the sciences. At the same time the culture is strong and the people are proud of who they are and where they live. They want to improve economically but do not want to give up the strengths of their culture and environment.
Part of the challenge for rural communities and their families is often just this: how to provide the children of the community with the type of education necessary to succeed in an ever more technologically oriented society while keeping them in local school systems that cannot afford the latest equipment and do not have immediate access to research facilities and large libraries or to the people who work exploring new technologies. Of course, this is exactly what the Internet can provide and this paper is about one rural area's efforts to provide its children with a 'window' into the larger technological world.
The Early Years
In 1992 the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and New Mexico Highlands University (NMHU) teamed up with the initial goal of forming a network of regional schools linked via a bulletin board system (bbs) to the engineering faculty at NMHU. The goals were to develop ways of educating Hispanic and other students with weak math and science backgrounds and to produce more minority engineering graduates.
Access to the Internet was at first a byproduct of the bulletin board system - once students had access to the university computers they could go out on the net but that was not the main purpose of the bbs. In 1994, however, with the development of hardware and software that made Internet access simpler and less expensive, this began to change. It became clear that the Internet provided exactly the kind of access to an international community of researchers, educators and students that would break the isolation felt by the students and school districts of the area.
A New Proposal
Thus, at the end of 1994, Dr. Bill Taylor, Director of the School of Mathematical Sciences and Engineering at NMHU, proposed a new focus for the on-going joint effort funded by NASA. In its first phase it would create a network of two high schools and two middle schools linked via frame-relay to the university. Through NASA funding enough computers and related equipment would be leased to provide each school with at least one Internet capable system. Expertise would also be provided to allow the schools to expand on this basic system in an orderly, workable manner. The rest of this paper talks about the basic strategy for making this proposal a reality.
Implementing the Plan
The key issues that must be considered in bringing computers into a
school system include:
1. Who initially provides the networking expertise?
2. Where are the computers housed in the schools and who is
responsible for them?
3. What software is used?
4. How are those responsible for the systems trained to
administer the systems?
5. How are the rest of the faculty, staff, and students
trained to use the systems?
1. Providing the Initial Expertise
The Highlands Computer Services staff and the faculty in the School of Mathematical Sciences and Engineering have always seen themselves as serving the needs of more than the university. It was natural then for Computer Services personnel and members of the Engineering faculty to provide the networking and hardware expertise to get the program off the ground. Although the issues that university faculty and computer center staff face are somewhat different from those faced in the K-12 systems, there is at least a common focus on education. Beneath the surface both groups deal with many of the same problems. The trick is to find university faculty who have a genuine interest in K-12 issues. In this case, that was not difficult and all the issues related to dealing with the local phone company, bringing up frame-relay, providing email and newsgroup servers, etc. were handled relatively easily.
The same was also true of software expertise. A member of the Computer Science faculty, interested in working with the local school systems, was recruited along with a senior level student. These two formed a team to install the necessary software and develop different training programs for system administrators, faculty users, and student users.
University collaboration in this effort has been not only viable but a real plus. As noted, one aspect of that success was the presence of university personnel truly interested in working with with the public schools. Another aspect was knowing when to get involved and how. For example, as the faculty in the various schools learned that Internet access would be available and as they came to understand how it could be used in the classroom, they all wanted their individual classrooms wired. Then came the issue of who should get what first. Wisely, the NMHU staff decided they would not make such 'political' decisions but at the same time they did not want to be part of an unplanned knot of wires criss-crossing the schools. They insisted then that the staff in each school develop a networking plan. To help them accomplish this members of a senior level networking course in the Computer Science program were assigned to each school. In this way, the schools provide their own plan but do so with guidance.
2. The Placement of the Computers in each school
It is natural to place computers in the classrooms or laboratories of those most knowledgeable about computers. This usually means that new systems are placed with science and math faculty. The advantages of this approach are obvious. Less training of system administrators is required, the new equipment may be close to other computer equipment, and students with a scientific or mathematical background have more immediate access.
There are also disadvantages to this approach. Too often computers located in one faculty member's classroom are seen as belonging to that faculty member. Other faculty and students not taking courses from that faculty member hesitate to use the equipment. In effect, its usage is limited to a segment of the school community.
Since the purpose of this NASA funded effort was to increase the number of students interested in engineering, mathematics, and science, the team wanted to place the computers in a site that was accessible to all students and managed by staff who saw themselves in a service role to the whole school. The natural place then was the library.
In the face of some subtle and not so subtle resistance from the technically trained staff in the various schools, this is were the computers were placed. The NMHU team understood the arguments of those resisting but felt that the advantages outweighed the disadvantages.
The chief disadvantage, of course, is that while the librarians were not knowledgeable in computer systems management, they would be responsible for daily maintenance of the systems, adding user and email accounts, and providing basic training. If the librarians in the schools had also resisted this idea, the team might well have dropped it, but they were enthusiastic and committed to learning the necessary material.
3. What software is used
The first issue that came up regarding software was what
operating system to install on the systems. The choices when the
computers were first installed included:
* a PC-based Unix;
* Windows for Workgroups;
* Windows NT.
It was determined that the chosen operating system must have good security features and be capable of running not only Internet based programs but also Windows based word processing, graphics, and other software likely to be found in a K-12 environment. The security issue ruled out Windows for Workgroups and second requirement ruled out Unix. (Some PC-based Unix systems allow one to switch between Unix and Dos/Windows but that was an extra level of complexity the team chose to avoid.)
That left Windows NT. Although, this meant that the librarians
would be required to familiarize themselves with an operating
systems they had never even seen before, the security issues
outweighed this problem. With Windows NT it has proven possible to
create four levels of users:
* Students
have access only to the their own account's disk space
and to programs provided to everyone;
* Power Users
in addition to the above have access to a set of
programs that allow them to create homepages;
* Faculty
in addition to the above have access to individual
student accounts;
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* Systems Administrators
have access to the entire system and have the
necessary privileges to add users and email accounts;
Using NT's ability to create separate environments for each user type, it has been possible to give each user type a different 'look and feel'. Student users do not even see the homepage creation utilities and no one except the systems administrators see the NT administration tools. (As an aside, the librarians asked that the games that come with NT remain on the systems. This was done but they are the only ones to have access to them. Unfortunately for
them, they have been too busy providing support, resetting passwords, etc. to have any time to play the games.)
The other software that comes with the systems is fairly standard: Netscape, QVT/Net, FTP, and Telnet. The librarian/administrators are free to add other software but, for the most part, they have kept the NASA funded machines clear and loaded additional software onto other network connected computers.
4. Training
The training program started in December of 1994 and has gone through a number of phases:
1. In the months before the computers were delivered, groups of 15-20 teachers and the librarians were brought to the NMHU campus and exposed to the net and its capabilities. This served to get the teachers excited and to provide them with a base knowledge both of how to use browsers and the other Internet tools as well as of what the net might offer as an educational tool. A similar session was held with a group of Mathematics, Engineering, and Science Achievement (MESA) students. Unfortunately, there were some unanticipated delays in getting the computers out to the schools and much of the practical knowledge was forgotten.
2. At about the same time, discussions were initiated with the librarians about their specific role in the program and in the weeks before the machines were delivered they were brought on the NMHU campus for special training in network administration and Windows NT in particular. When the computers were finally delivered to the schools in the Fall of 1995, members of NMHU team met with each librarian and her staff at the school site to practice the administrative tasks. This combination of formal training and individual review sessions proved very successful. Most of the problems encountered after this related to unclear instructions in the user manuals provided by the NMHU team.
3. After the computers were placed in the libraries, general sessions were held for the faculties and staffs at each school site. These were primarily demonstration sessions, showing what was available on the net and examples of how Internet resources could and were being used in classrooms elsewhere.
4. At this point the schools were left alone for awhile, each to go its own way. In most cases it was the students who quickly found educational (and other!) uses for the systems. Just before the Christmas 1995 break, new training sessions for faculty were initiated. This time faculty who were interested had to submit a plan of how they intended to use the training either to improve their usage of the Internet in classroom related activities or in the training of other faculty and students. In addition to the proposals for training faculty and students, accepted proposal topics included the development of a lesson plan and home page on the Santa Fe Trail and the development of a net-based Spanish language curriculum. Fifteen faculty attended this workshop.
In addition, one session was again provided for MESA students. This time the MESA students were required to create their own homepages oriented towards their specific science or math interests. These pages became the basis for the homepage of one of the middle schools.
5. The librarians went back to their schools and initiated school-wide training sessions. In one school this took the form of a principal mandated effort whereby each faculty person met with the librarian or a teacher who had attended the workshop mentioned in the previous paragraph during his or her prep period to learn Netscape and the basics of email. In another school, faculty attended either a morning or afternoon training session offered by the librarian during an in-service training day.
Conclusions
The program has been a success. First, hundreds of students who a year ago had never used an Internet browser or sent email are now regularly involved in Internet activities. Similarly, over fifty faculty who had only dreamed of incorporating Internet activities into their class preparations or assignments are now making the Internet part of their teaching process.
Second, school administrators now recognize the importance of the Internet and are supporting the program's efforts. Time has been set aside to train the teachers and all of the schools are in the process of creating plans to expand access beyond the libraries.
Third and most important have been the results of placing the computers in the libraries under the supervision of the librarians. At a recent meeting with the librarians to determine the needs for future training, it was determined that the basic training mission has been a success. All faculty who were not refusing to use the new technology felt comfortable using it. Given the fact that the single most often heard criticism of new technology in the classroom is that teachers do not know how to use it, this is especially important.
The authors attribute most of this success to the efforts of the school librarians and to the placement of the computers in the libraries. Through their dedication and role as service providers to the whole school, the librarians have made everyone feel welcome, comfortable, and capable of using the Internet. Both faculty and staff have been technologically empowered.
The Future
Over the coming months the training focus will shift. First, there will be a workshop specifically on developing Internet based curriculum. Second, there will be one or more workshops on homepage creation for clubs, organizations, and classes wishing to put themselves on the net.
A new focus of the NMHU team will be to get a similar computer system working in the local community library. This was part of the original plan but has been held up due to a small construction project taking place in the library. The enthusiasm of the local library staff has not waned during the delay and they are anxious to begin training and to train the public in turn. This time it will be the community that will be technologically empowered.