Imagine.

Professor of Geology Stephen Jay Gould lectures his core class, "Science B-16," on evolution, and students in Japan take notes.

Believe it or not, video lines now exist which allow such a thing to happen, according to Harvard computer experts. Assistant Professor of Computer Science Victor J. Milenkovic predicts that the technology will be used widely within the next 10 years.

"It's just a matter of the cost [of the technology] and that cost will be dropping so eventually someone at Harvard may take another course at Princeton or someone at Princeton will take a course at Harvard," Milenkovic says.

Electronic communication may offer this sort of future. And at Harvard, much speculation about the future focuses on the Internet, a global data communication network. Faculty, administrators and 78 percent of undergraduates have registered University accounts which link them to the network, and the numbers are growing.

But, as the Internet comes to dominate communication in higher education, Harvard looks more like a follower than a leader. University officials, a two-month Crimson investigation found, are not fully prepared for the communication revolution--a revolution that could define, whether Harvard likes it or not, the nature of higher education.

"I don't think there is any way it avoid it," says President Neil L. Rudenstine. "We cannot not have computers, we cannot not have networks, we cannot not have e-mail. Moving into the more public world seems to me to be absolutely inevitable and desirable."

Increased use of the Internet at Harvard is also likely to make a University which has been private for 358 years significantly more public.

"Our scholarly and intellectual resources should be shared with the world, just as we are able to enjoy theirs," says Dean of the Faculty Jeremy R. Knowles.

But for Harvard this future carries a risk. The University is a business, and with many of its unique information resources likely to be availableover the Internet, administrators worry that theirproduct--a Harvard education--could lose some ofits appeal.

"We will act in a way that sensibly expands theopportunities for our students," Knowles says,then adds pointedly, "while not destroying thevalue of the product."

Students, Faculty Drive Changes

The efforts of students and faculty are alreadyforcing the administration to look seriously tothe future. Members of the community have starteddozens of projects designed to harness theInternet, from the Harvard College Library'sGateway Project to increase the availability ofon-line database to the student technology groupDigitas' effort at publishing a magazine over thenetwork.

All around campus, students are using theInternet to access previously unavailableinformation and to solve seemingly insurmountableproblems.

Indeed, Harvard stands to gain from the rise ofelectronic communication. Over the Internet, theUniversity's human resources--the professorialminds that can't be replicated bymicrochips--could become even more important to amass audience which will finally be able to accessthem.

"If anything, it will increase Harvard'sluster," Milenkovic says of technology's role inthe future. "I just think it will [mean] a moreconvenient and cheaper and better qualityeducation."