Natrona County High School teacher Scott Underbrink had one problem while teaching Russian to students in Lusk: A video camera linking the two classrooms was set-up too far away from the Lusk kids.

"When you're teaching a language, it's important to see how your kids react," said Underbrink, who asked to have the camera moved closer to the Lusk students. "It seemed like it worked pretty well after that."

More and more Wyoming schools are taking advantage of the state's compressed video network to bring foreign languages, aquarium visits and chats with scientists to their students.

The Wyoming Equality Video Network began in 2001.Each high school is equipped with a two-way video conferencing system, as are Wyoming's seven community colleges, the University of Wyoming and the Wyoming Department of Education.

A 2009 report from the Sloan Consortium, a Massachusetts advocacy group for online education, found that more than a million K-12 students used online courses in the 2007-2008 school year. It was a 47 percent increase from 2005-2006.

Underbrink has taught Russian to students in Gillette, Kacey and other Wyoming towns through the video system. It's no different than being in a classroom with those kids, he said.

"It's a real teaching environment," Underbrink said. "As a teacher, you kind of forget that it's a television there."

Chuck Mitchell, Wyoming Department of Education distance education supervisor, said some schools don't use the network.

"Those that do use it, use it in abundance," Mitchell said.

Many schools use the video network to broadcast classes such as French and Spanish, while also choosing special events.

"We're actually able to offer some unique connections for students," said Tim Lockwood, education department spokesman

Those connections have included video chats with Holocaust survivors and members of the Hubble spacecraft team. Students in Wamsutter connected with a marine laboratory in Atlanta to visit with a shark specialist and take a virtual underwater tour of the aquarium.

Mitchell said the department is looking for more instructors and reaching out to schools to encourage using the video network.

"We hope it continues to grow and expand," he said. "This is an excellent opportunity for any Wyoming students to take advantage of a truly equitable resource for education."

Reach education reporter Jasa Santos at (307) 266-0593 or at jasa.santos@trib.com. Read her education blog at tribtown.trib.com/JasaSantos/blog.

WEN usage

Below is a list of the top 5 schools who used the most hours of WEN video time for the 2007-2008 school year. For more information about the WEN video system, log on to the Wyoming Department of Education's Web site at k12.wy.us.

Northwest Community College 1334.5 hours

Cody High School 828 hours

Worland High School 723.5 hours

Lovell High School 569 hours

Basin-Riverside High School 482 hours