The Mat-Su Borough School District was awarded a $270,000 USDA rural development grant to start a distance learning system. The system will hook up rural schools like Talkeetna and Trapper Creek Elementary as well as Su Valley Junior and Senior High School to videoconferencing and online streaming.The USDA grant’s intention is to provide rural areas access to education, training and health care resources via new technology. It will allow the rural schools to connect via videoconferencing and the Internet to the Mat-Su core area and also to the University of Alaska Fairbanks campus. The focus is on literacy, math and science as well as preparing young students for high school.

Mat-Su school district spokeswoman Catherine Esary said that the distance learning system is in its early development stages and that details are not fleshed out yet. However, the Talkeetna and Trapper Creek Elementary schools and Su Valley High School are on top of the list to receive distance-learning capabilities. Other schools to benefit from the distance learning project are Sutton and Glacier View.