Our History: In November of 1993, two technology innovations began enriching East's curriculum. For many years, they continued to provide a means of electronic collaboration, not only for East staff and students, but also for the entire Anchorage educational community. East On-Line, connected "Pods" (each with five computers) in eighteen East classrooms. This was the school's East On-Line technology grant project. Students used computers to assist their learning in nearly all core subject areas, including Resource assistance for Special Education. The East on Line/EdCom LAN allowed collaborative projects among the staff and students, and featured conferencing, as well as dial-in and dial-out telecommunications (remember modems?). "EdCom Online" (Educational Community Online) bulletin board service (BBS) provided technology and administrative support for an electronic Bulletin Board System for the entire Anchorage educational community and was a component of the East On-Line technology grant.

Today: EOL is still the heart of East's electronic community. EOL uses a FirstClass server/client system (published by OpenText Software). FirstClass provides powerful mail handling and bulletin board services and is the electronic backbone of East's intranet. The server is a Macintosh X-Serve, 2 Gigabytes of RAM, and Mac OS 10.4.6. Currently, access from outside the district is via the Internet (using a web browser or FC client) and from within the district, FirstClass Client 8.2. The FirstClass client can be downloaded at the OpenText web site.

Our FirstClass software was the technical underpinnings for the first-ever Internet-based class in the Anchorage School District. Students could log on to the server from anywhere and at anytime.