Students could soon be taking classes from teachers outside of the Re-1 district without leaving the comfort of their own schools.

Tuesday evening, Charlie Powell, technology director for the Southwest Board of Cooperative Services, presented a plan to the Re-1 school board to jump-start distance learning for students in seven area school districts.

They include schools in Cortez, Mancos, Dolores, and Dove Creek, and involve Pueblo Community College, San Juan Basin Technical School, Southwest Board of Cooperative Services, and Adult Basic Education.

Powell is proposing that the school district approve using a $300,000 federal grant that was earmarked specifically for distance learning within these school districts to help REANET, a telecommunications corporation based in Durango, install a fiber-optic connection between the schools.

The fiber-optic technology would transport live images to each of the school’s studio monitors to simulate a virtual classroom, and allow live communication between students and teachers.

Fiber-optic lines are made of glass strands, installed either underground or through the power lines. These strands can transmit information at greatly increased speeds. For instance, a file with 1 billion bits of information may take 8.2 hours to download from the Internet, but with fiber-optics it takes 0.1 seconds.

Constructing the system would help rural schools provide additional course options for students with special needs or interests. In addition, the technology could eventually tap into an international fiber-optics network and bring together teachers and classrooms from across the United States.

The board plans to discuss the proposal at its next board meeting on Sept. 5, after discussing the proposal with school administration officials. But if the board decides to nix the plan, the grant must be returned to the federal coffers by Sept. 30.

At the Tuesday meeting, board members seemed hesitant to sign a seven-year contract with REANET. "I’m not going to strap a board in three years with this kind of financial responsibility, and I’m not going to strap them with out-of-date technology," said school board president Steve Hinton.

Powell assured the board that the speed at which the system transfers information virtually guarantees that it will stay state-of-the art for the foreseeable future.

He estimates that each monitor would cost close to $50,000. But the cost of developing the infrastructure would reach over $1 million, and without the grant money as an incentive. REANET would not likely implement the system. Constructing the infrastructure would be funded by REANET.

If each school district signs a seven-year contract with REANET, the company would then take on the expensive project of constructing a fiber-optics network linking all of the schools.

In return, REANET promises to provide telecommunications services at least 10 percent below what its competitors are charging, and has also verbally promised to keep the system outfitted with the best technology available.

REANET is quoting the district a price of $264 per month for distance-learning services, and would also provide the district’s other telecommunications services at 10 percent below competitors. This price does not include the cost for the district to subsidize a classroom at San Juan Basin Technical College, which would host the center of the system.

"I see this project as being a tremendous boon to all of Southwest Colorado. Dolores and Dove Creek are looking at it as being viable to its economical capability," said Powell. "This is a tremendous cooperative venture, which was the basis for writing this grant."

The project certainly could speed up the economic growth of Dolores, Mancos, and Dove Creek. Without the distance-learning project, these communities are unlikely to provide enough business to tempt companies to construct the expensive infrastructure. After REANET constructs the infrastructure it would be able to offer these communities fiber-optics services.

"This might be the project that drives those services to other communities," Powell told the board.

Even without the distance-learning project, the city of Cortez will soon be connected to a highway of fiber-optics that stretches from Albuquerque to Grand Junction. Pathnet, a national service provider, is currently installing the fiber-optics system and has plans to complete the project in 2001.

In addition, the city of Cortez is planning on installing fiber-optics within the city, so that businesses and government services can link directly to the system. The planned Cortez network would run at approximately 100 times the speed of a T1 phone line.

But if fiber-optics are not linked to Dolores, Mancos, and Dove Creek, Cortez would not be able implement distance learning.

Rick Smith, director of the city of Cortez’s department of general services, said that the city wants to build a 48-strand network. Twelve strands would be reserved for government entities, and 36 for private businesses.

In addition, telecommunications companies could lease the capacity of the 36 strands and connect homeowners via copper wires. He estimates that putting in the system would cost the city about $1 million, including money available from grants.

Some grant money has been made available to bring fiber-optic services to each county seat in Colorado. The state has plans to introduce a multi-use network, and has given the five-county regional economic-development council a $1.37 million grant to help county seats afford the fiber-optic services.