BY COLIN HICKEY

Staff Writer

Oceanography, pre-veterinary medicine, basic Mandarin, biotechnology, contemporary Irish literature.

What do these courses have in common?

The answer is they all will be available for high school students in five school systems in central Maine starting in January.

That is the wonder of Virtual High School.

"This is about opening up opportunities for children that we can't afford to offer as a single high school," SAD 47 Superintendent James C. Morse Sr. said.

Waterville, Winslow, SAD 49 and SAD 52 are the other Kennebec Alliance school systems involved with the program, which is nationally accredited and uses only teachers certified in the discipline they teach.

Virtual High School is based in Maynard, Mass., but the 326 online courses it offers are available to 570 schools across the country and around the world, according to Carol Arnold of Virtual High School.

Arnold said Maine is one of the nonprofit company's best customers with 26 schools already participating, not including the five Kennebec Alliance schools that will come online in January.

Madison Area Memorial High School and Mt. View High School of Thorndike are two local schools on the current list.

"Maine is a really hot area for us right now," Arnold said, "because there is a big need for it there."

That big need is about the struggle to offer specialty courses in a rural state that features relatively small schools and budgetary concerns that grow by the day.

Morse said a school can't justify adding oceanography to the curriculum if only five students sign up.

But with Virtual High School, the number of students interested is no longer an issue because the expense is minor, Morse said.

Morse introduced his school board to Virtual High School this week, emphasizing that the Alliance views the online learning opportunity as a pilot program initially.

He also stressed that the idea is to provide elective courses area high schools do not offer.

Students would not be allowed to register for an online course that the high school offers in the traditional classroom.

Virtual High School is not a threat to teacher employment in SAD 47, Morse assured his school board.

"There is no impact on our staff whatsoever," he said. -- the same applies to other Alliance high schools.

For a relatively slight fee -- about $1,800 per school system -- the Alliance gets 25 Virtual High School slots for the spring semester, or five per high school.

Morse said the logistics of how those slots will be awarded must still be worked out.

Andrew Haynie, a Messalonskee High School math teacher, will coordinate the program for the five high schools.

Meanwhile, another Messalonskee faculty member, English teacher Dave Boardman, is preparing an online course on new-media journalism for Virtual High School.

Boardman, who is pursuing a doctorate in literacy and technology, started a 22-week course on online instruction this week through Virtual High School.

His plan is to have the course -- which essentially will be the creation of an online magazine -- on the Virtual High School catalog by next fall.

Boardman said the magazine will incorporate podcasts, video, slideshows and other devices.

"There are many ways of telling a story," he said. "This course will explore how those different methods will work together."

Boardman is excited about the online pilot project.

"It is really a long-term investment for the district to get involved in this," he said, "and an investment of my time, but it's something I believe in."

Colin Hickey -- 861-9205

chickey@centralmaine.com