Verizon Awards $1 Million to Virginia Schools, Colleges; Makes Last Installment on $7-Million Pledge

RICHMOND, Va. -- More than a dozen public schools and colleges across the Old Dominion soon will

receive $1 million in grants from Verizon Communications to jump-start or expand their distance learning projects.

With these latest awards, Verizon gave $7 million over the past seven years to the educational communities in Virginia

to promote distance learning initiatives. As a result, there are over 130 sites equipped for distance learning throughout

Virginia including state universities, community colleges and public schools.

"Verizon is proud to have taken a leading role in enhancing the quality of public education in Virginia,"

said Robert Woltz, president of Verizon Virginia. "Today there are lot's of initiatives around the state with many

different supporters looking for ways to use technology to improve education. But when we began in 1994, that was

not the case. It's gratifying that our grants have helped many rural, urban and suburban schools find out how to get

more for their educational dollar."

The winners of the 2000 Verizon Virginia distance learning grants are:

Chesapeake Public Schools -- $115,000 to purchase equipment to implement an integrated audio, video

and data service.

Christopher Newport University -- $65,000 to expand the university's Teachers' Academy and establish an

interactive learning partnership among the university, Newport News public schools, the Virginia Institute of Marine

Science and the Mariners Museum.

Commonwealth's Governor's School -- $40,000 to expand the school's distance learning network. It plans

to establish three new sites -in Spotsylvania, Stafford and King George counties.

Fairfax County Public Schools -- $26,000 to expand the school system's distance learning capabilities to

accommodate homebound and hospitalized students using laptops and videoconferencing applications.

Hopewell Public Schools -- $91,000 to provide distance learning programs for students, teachers and

administrators in collaboration with the Science Museum of Virginia. The funds also will be used to establish virtual

field trips to Hopewell's sister-city in England.

New Century Communications Network -- $104,000 to establish a new ATM (asynchronous transfer

mode) distance learning classroom. ATM technology offers high-speed Internet access, along with

videoconferencing. The New Century Communications Network is a consortium of public schools in Allegheny,

Botetourt, Craig, Floyd, Franklin, Giles, Montgomery, Pulaski and Roanoke counties. Other network members

include the cities of Radford, Roanoke and Salem; the Southwest Virginia Governor's School; Ferrum, Roanoke and

Hollins colleges; Radford University; Virginia Tech and Dabney Lancaster, New River and Virginia Western

community colleges.

Norfolk State University -- $76,000 to implement an interactive multi-media instructional system, with

distance learning sites located at Norfolk State, Ruffner Academy and Oakmont Community Center. The Norfolk

Public Schools and the Norfolk Redevelopment and Housing Authority are partners in the project.

Powhatan County Public Schools -- $45,000 to establish interactive distance learning classrooms at the

county's two elementary schools.

Radford University -- $185,000 to equip two distance learning classrooms and purchase portable

videoconferencing units to expand Radford's program and reach new sites in southwest Virginia.

Shenandoah Public Education Network -- $69,500 to add seven distance learning classrooms at regional

high schools and public libraries in the central Shenandoah Valley of Virginia.

Tech Prep Region 2000 Educational Consortium -- $70,000 to provide interactive distance learning

between Central Virginia Community College and Appomattox High School.

Tidewater Community College -- $72,000 to build an interactive distance learning classroom to focus on

health information.

Virginia Commonwealth University -- $41,500 to purchase videoconferencing units to test the feasibility of

using videoconferencing technology over the Internet in existing classrooms.

The grants were awarded by judges representing government, education, the information technology industry and

Verizon.

Verizon's distance learning grants were available to kindergarten through twelfth-grade public schools and all

state-supported colleges and universities in the Verizon Virginia service area, which covers roughly two-thirds of the

public schools in the state. Recipients use the grants to purchase classroom equipment, such as video monitors,

cameras and microphones, necessary for interactive distance learning.

The distance learning networks, funded by the Verizon grants, are totally interactive - visually and verbally. Students

and faculty are able to see one another and communicate spontaneously over the network. And teachers can call on

students who raise their hands, much the same as they would in a natural classroom setting.

Woltz suggested that interactive distance learning has helped bring about a measure of equality in course offerings

among the schools.

"When we began seven years ago, we wanted to find out if distance learning could be an effective tool to solve

teacher availability problems for urban and rural schools," Woltz said."If we could get an interactive

picture of the teacher at one school into the classrooms of other schools, would the remote kids actually learn? What

we learned is that it can do that and much more to help the entire spectrum of students from underprivileged to gifted,

from geographically challenged to home-bound. We're proud to have been part of this learning process."

Verizon launched its first distance learning project in 1994 in Southwest Virginia by linking two Lee County high

schools with Mountain Empire Community College over a 50-mile fiber optic network. The schools today provide all

programming on the network.

Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE:VZ), formed by the merger of Bell Atlantic and GTE, is one of the world's

leading providers of communications services. Verizon companies are the largest providers of wireline and wireless

communications in the United States, with more than 101 million access line equivalents and more than 27 million

wireless customers. A Fortune 10 company with more than 260,000 employees and approximately $60 billion in

1999 revenues, Verizon's global presence extends to 40 countries in the Americas, Europe, Asia and the Pacific. For

more information on Verizon, visit www.verizon.com.