Distance education and technology: What are the choices for higher education?

The Education Network of Maine (ENM), the distance education arm of the Uni versity of Maine System, connects 10 Centers and more than 100 sites around the state of Maine with an interactive television system that broadcasts t o homes, offices, and the 100 plus sites. In addition to delivering courses over an interactive television system, the ENM has begun to offer courses asynchronously using the World Wide Web, videotapes, and other delivery mod es, increasing access to higher education for Maine citizens. Ongoing evalu ations reveal that students were satisfied with the logistics of courses of fered, with the professors, and with the technology. An area of weakness in one of the courses studied here was the lack of connection students in the various locations felt to each other.