Graduate students "meet" over the video hookup to consult on curriculum and teaching methods for education and outreach activities. For a course in adaptive optics, students from other campuses participate with those who are physically present. The center also holds a summer internship program for community college students at its associated universities. The students meet on the UC Santa Cruz campus at the beginning and end of the program, but in between they stay in contact via the videoconference facilities.

"It's not as seamless as if they were all in the same room, but they feel they're getting quite a bit out of the experience," says Claire Max, professor and associate director of the center.

AP Physics B course offered by UCCP (Source: Rafael Granados, UCCP)

The issue of access is also being addressed by UC at the K-12 level. Advantages inherent to online learning are exploited in the AP Physics course offered by the UC College Prep (UCCP) program, a state-funded initiative run through the University of California Santa Cruz that provides college prep courses to California high school students who would otherwise not have access to such courses. "We've found that a large percentage of what we need to offer is in the sciences, and the main reason for that is that the cost of the laboratory equipment needed for these types of courses is prohibitive for some schools," says Chris Roads, UCCP's instruction coordinator.

To compensate, UCCP developed a series of courses, including AP Physics, with interactive, multimedia-rich online content. Students go through each lesson, answering questions and receiving feedback along the way, and are required to complete practice problems and quizzes at the end of each series of lessons. The instructor accesses the students' work online, grades it, and returns it to them with feedback. Students receive daily email contact, and a regularly scheduled "virtual classroom" brings them together with the instructor or tutors to communicate online through voice and chat.

"We can bring simulations, video images and interactive learning techniques to the electronic medium that these students wouldn't get in a traditional setting," says Roads. "Some of these concepts are very hard to visualize when they're being taught in the classroom. The repetition that can be gained by practicing online, the flexibility that enables students to go at their own pace and easily review earlier content, and the immediate feedback that this program provides are all very helpful. Ideally, you would also have an instructor present as the students are learning. But, given budget realities, the efficiencies and advantages of the online environment are attractive."