Don't let the cables sleep

The course offerings available to students in rural and inner-city Alabama schools tend to be far less extensive than those offered to their counterparts in better-funded suburban schools. As a result, our public schools effectively have limited many students' academic horizons due to factors entirely out of their control, such as their family's socioeconomic status or hometown. That result is untenable in a country where we preach that everyone deserves an equal opportunity to succeed through hard work.

That's why I'm a big fan of Gov. Bob Riley's new Access program, which seeks to use Web-based classes and videoconferences to alleviate the disparities in course offerings in the state's public schools. The program is in its infancy -- it's only five months old and is offered only in 44 high schools thus far -- but the concept has great potential and could expand to hundreds of schools in a hurry. For sure, Access has its limitations -- chief among them are the lack of face-to-face interaction and the reliance on a handful of instructors to teach students in multiple schools at once -- but if nothing else, it's a good stopgap measure to provide advanced-level coursework to students who otherwise would find such opportunities foreclosed to them.

In an ideal world, all schools could offer a diverse curriculum, and Access would be unnecessary. But in this world, where a Black Belt school just can't match an over-the-mountain school's resources right now, Access is a vital effort to allow determined students to pursue the same high-quality education regardless of where they live. This program deserves our support.