School access to the Internet has been spiraling since 1994. Only 14 percent of those same schools had placed the Internet connections in classrooms, and fewer than four in 10 students had e-mail access, but such an evolution may be just a matter of time. By 2000, according to an Educational Testing Service study, nearly nine in 10 public schools will have a connection to the Internet. The national ratio of computers to students hovers around 10 to one. The preparatory needs of educators themselves, however, often are not addressed.
Some districts offer teachers intensive training, as well as classroom and even home computers.
But experts maintain that teachers and ultimately students need more than one-shot training opportunities. Texas has a technology requirement for teacher certification. In the schools, teachers sometimes feel left out of technology planning. The track record thus far is poor. Many technology plans devote themselves to the purchase, timing, connecting and placement of computers, routers and file servers.