Creating the K-20 Educational Network

Take Washington state legislators, educators, technical experts, and private business. Mix in cooperation and dedication to achieving a goal. Turn the pressure up to high.

The result? With the 1998-99 academic year, our state's universities, colleges, and school districts now have the K-20 Educational Telecommunications Network. It provides faculty, librarians, clinicians, and students with state-of-the-art, cost-effective, and easy access to each other and to our information-based world.

Tools It Provides

Technical experts at the UW and elsewhere in the state helped develop the K-20 Network, which provides all Washington educational institutions with three powerful teaching tools:

Internet services--A very high bandwidth, regional network. In the past, traffic between some K-20 sites had to be routed all the way to California and back. Now, with the K-20 Network, more data can be transmitted locally with less bandwidth at less cost--a crucial component because Internet use has been doubling each year.

Interactive video--An efficient, cost-effective method of providing ISDN-based video services in support of distance learning. The K-20 Network enhances a system already in use and allows anyone with compatible coding/decoding technology to dial a phone number for an instant video connection.

Satellite broadcast--A state-of-the-art uplink system for broadcasting videotaped classes. Through the K-20 Network, video can be broadcast around the state with exceptional signal quality.

Depending on the needs of the programs and students, faculty can pull from this flexible mix of technologies and find the appropriate balance between these new tools and more traditional face-to-face instruction.

To explore the array of opportunities presented by the technology itself, and to integrate these new tools for teaching and learning, faculty can enlist the knowledgeable help of the people with the UWired program and its Center for Teaching, Learning, and Technology, as well as the UW Libraries and C&C.

Benefits for Students, Teachers, and Business

• Greater accessibility for students in remote areas

• More options in using distance learning to educate the projected growing number of students in our state universities

• Increased communication between faculty and students, among students, and among educators

• Increased interaction among universities, between universities and community colleges, and between educational institutions and the business world

• Increased communication and sharing of knowledge between university and K-12 educators

• Regular meetings through videoconferencing

• Greater flexibility in reaching people in the workplace, on their desktops

• Extension of UW programs and expertise to other educational, community, and health-care institutions

What will the K-20 Network do for businesses in the state? Today, professionals in the business and scientific world use digital communication tools as part of their daily routine. With the K-20 Network, students will not only enter the workforce with knowledge and technical skills, but can update those skills at the workplace through on-site video classes and lesson follow-up with teachers over the Internet.

Building and Managing for the Future

The UW has an additional key role in the future of the K-20 Network. The Washington State Legislature funded the K-20 Operations Cooperative (KOCO) to provide ongoing operations support. The UW is managing KOCO on a contract basis, an assignment it earned based on its proven success in operating NorthWestNet (now Verio Northwest), the region's first Internet provider.

UW faculty, librarians, students, and clinicians can make use of the K-20 Network to explore different and innovative ways of teaching and learning. And because the design of the K-20 Network is expandable and well planned, it will support new tools as they arise for many years to come.

Additional information on the K-20 Network is available at www.wa.gov/dis/k20topc/