Across the country, many states have created organizations to provide online, web-based courses, for high school students. According to recently released data, in 2006-07, one-third of high school seniors in Utah took a class online through the state's Electronic High School and more than 52,000 students were served by the Florida Virtual School network.

A national poll sponsored by Education Next and the Program on Education Policy and Governance at Harvard University (PEPG) reveals that most Americans favor the use of public funds for such course offerings. The supporting rationale comes in great part from the opportunity for students to take advanced coursework they might not otherwise be able to take and to help students from rural communities gain greater access to a wider variety of courses.

Serving students who cannot currently receive the courses they desire is one of the greatest growth areas for online courses at the high school level. One the largest increases has been in Advanced Placement courses.

Currently, one third of all high schools nationwide offered no Advanced Placement (AP) classes in 2002-03. In addition, many of those that do provide AP offer only a small fraction of the 34 courses for which AP exams are available.

In addition, rural schools often have limited resources and are therefore unable to offer a broad curriculum to their students. Yet another segment of the high school age population that could be well-served by public funding of such course offerings is the 2 million students currently being home-schooled.