Home on the Web

By Peter West

As the Texas legislature haggled last spring over a sweeping reform of the state's education laws, every comma and clause of the proposed legislation was distributed to homes across the Lone Star State on the Internet, courtesy of the 800,000 members of the state PTA.

Using computer services donated by Onramp Access Inc., an Austin-based provider of Internet services, the PTA created its own home page on the World Wide Web containing drafts of the bill and other information for parents.

The Internet gives one of the nation's largest PTA chapters a direct electronic link to the homes of many members, says Bill Cox, one of the organization's directors...