July 23, 2001


Research Subcommittee
Committee of Science
U.S. House of Representatives

Located at the foothills of Palomar Mountain, east of San Diego
County, the Pala Indian Reservation is home to 600 tribal members
- including more than 150 children who attend elementary school on
the reservation, as well as the Pala Learning Center after school.

Going online used to be a waiting game at the Pala Learning Center.
Only one of the center's computers had dial-up Internet access,
and the students who came there to do after-school research had to
wait their turn for 30 minutes of use.  A lot of the students would
get upset and leave.  That changed when the learning center became
the first of three Indian reservations in San Diego County to be
connected to the High-Performance Wireless Network.  The Tribal
Chairman, Robert Smith and I dreamed of access to high-speed Internet
connectivity and working closely with Mr. Hans-Werner Braun, Research
Scientist at UCSD and Kimberly Bruch, Science Writer of UCSD turned
this dream into a reality.

By providing the Learning Center with high-speed connectivity has
opened up an incredible amount of opportunities for the tribe and
its future generations.  We have started classes to teach both the
older and younger generations to become more familiar with the
opportunities made available to them through the Internet.  The
students are excited to learn more about the Internet, how it helps
them complete their homework, and access more sophisticated sites
with multimedia files.  For instance, now the students are able to
finally experience virtual museums, libraries, and even compare
their own Pala culture with those of other American Indian tribes.

Connection to the high-performance network has changed the way
students learn.  In addition to using any computer in the learning
center, they can use one of four video camera-equipped machines to
receive real-time tutoring from UCSD students.  With the webcams
the students can interact with the tutors and tutors can interact
with the students.  We have seen a lot of progress, where students
have raised their math levels from D's and F's to A's and B's.
Parents are pleased, not only for what its doing for their children,
but also how it has helped their community.

In summary, we cannot say enough about the High-Performance and
its limitless resourcefulness.  We encourage you to call us at
760-742-1997 if you have any questions or would like to discuss
this further.

Sincerely,



Robert H. Smith				Doretta J. Musick
Tribal Chairman				Library Director