History of MOREnet

MOREnet's origin can be traced to the mid 1980s. Its influence on Missouri's education, library and research community accelerated in the mid 1990s and continues grow today. Here are some of the highlights:

1986

The University of Missouri (MU) co-founded one of the first multi-state research networks and connected to the National Science Foundation's NSFnet, the precursor to the current Internet. NSFnet was created to allow researchers at leading research institutions to communicate via e-mail, access federally funded supercomputer centers and to transfer data between researchers. University campuses were connected to each other and NSFnet via MOR-NET (Missouri Research Network) at 56 Kbps. This speed met the need for the small number of users sending text and files without a need for immediate response.

MU was a charter member of an NSF-sponsored mid-states group called MIDnet (56 Kbps), a network to support scientific research. Students and faculty immediately took it over. The highest volume of traffic was e-mail.

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1991

Full-Time Employees: 2
Connections: 12
Budget: $100,000

The National Science Foundation created its Connections to the NSFnet Program. MOREnet's roots can be traced to a request from Missouri's four-year public colleges, who expressed interest in getting connected to the NSFnet, a precursor to today's Internet. Missouri's four-year public higher education institutions developed a white paper proposing a consortium to manage and operate a statewide network. MU was asked to create and staff an organization, develop rules and a formal business plan to support the consortium. This put the E (for education) in MOREnet and created the first statewide higher education network in the country. MOREnet also was the first multi-institution technology-based consortium in Missouri. Text-based data predominated the network, but there were more users, including non-research faculty and students in technical disciplines.

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1993

Full-Time Employees: 4.5
Connections: 31
Budget: $300,000

After obtaining the NSF grant, the network began to grow almost immediately. Conversations with the Public Service Commission, regarding potential problems servicing independent institutions and the possible need to become a regulated telecommunications carrier, resulted in the conclusion that this was educational activity and not subject to regulation.

Two-year public and independent higher education institutions began to join the consortium.

A pilot project with the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education involving 100 school districts was started, and support services were expanded to include hands-on training, technical consultation and documentation.

Another project was started in Columbia that led to the Columbia Online Information Network (COIN), an effort to provide community access to local information and to the Internet.

The term "Internet" began to show up in some general readership and the World Wide Web was first described in research literature as an interesting, but unproved, concept.

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1994

Full-Time Employees: 6.5
Connections: 165
Budget: $1,100,000

MOREnet received its first full agency contract with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE), a multi-year initiative to provide network access, training and support services to public school districts in Missouri.

DESE secured a one-time appropriation of $600,000 to begin the Technology Network Project (TNP) pilot with 100 school districts participating.

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1995

Full-Time Employees: 30
Budget: $3,400,000

DESE TNP was funded with a one-time appropriation of $5 million spread over three years. This marked the start of earmarked funds coming into MOREnet with specific intent to deliver services to a specific group. The services, however, would run on top of the network that had been built by the Consortium. Part of the DESE funds went to pay for MOREnet infrastructure.

The Missouri Secretary of State secured core budget funding of $800,000 to provide Internet access, backbone and network services and technical services to the state's tax-supported libraries, the Remote Electronic Access of Libraries Project (REAL). The services, however, would run on top of the network that had been built by the Consortium. Part of the REAL funds go to pay for MOREnet infrastructure.

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1996

Full-Time Employees: 46.5
Budget: $5,000,000

The Missouri Secretary of State secured $500,000 for shared electronic resources (information databases) available to entire MOREnet community.

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1997

Full-Time Employees: 66
Budget: $5,000,000

The MOREnet2 backbone initiative increased the backbone to 45 Mbps, 30 times faster than the 1993 service. The driving force for network growth is the ability to move increasing volumes of data and video.

The Missouri Office of Administration secured a one-time appropriation of $6 million spread over three years to develop up to 80 community information networks throughout Missouri. The Missouri Express Program would provide Internet access, backbone and network services and technical services to the state's tax-supported libraries.

DESE TNP was funded with additional one-time appropriation of $5 million spread over three years. Part of the DESE funds go to pay for MOREnet infrastructure.

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1998

Full-Time Employees: 80
Budget: $16,400,000

The Coordinating Board of Higher Education (CBHE) secured a $5 million core budget appropriation to offload the cost of the integrated network and services from the projects and the MOREnet Consortium. CBHE also provided public higher education with T-1 connections to MOREnet backbone.

DESE TNP also secures core budget funding of $5 million.

The shared electronic resources core appropriation increased to $600,000.

A pilot program called Multimedia Interactive Networked Technologies (MINTs) began in six school districts in St. Louis County. MINTs aimed to train teachers to use technology in the classroom and remove technology barriers traditionally experienced by schools in an effort to determine how student performance would be affected.

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1999

Full-Time Employees: 96
Connections: 900
Budget: $26,500,000

The MOREnet3 backbone initiative increased the backbone to 155 Mbps, enabling full-scale interactive video services and additional multimedia applications.

CBHE secured additional core budget funding ($10.7 million total) for growth of MOREnet backbone, Internet access and related technical services for use by entire MOREnet community. This included funding to support development of fully-integrated video capacity. CBHE also funds high-speed connections for all public higher education institutions and advanced research applications.

REAL Program core budget appropriations increases to $2 million.

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2000

CBHE secured additional core budget funding for growth of MOREnet backbone, Internet access and related technical services for use by the entire MOREnet community. Funding for increasing public higher education connections to 10 Mbps was secured.

DESE TNP also received additional core budget funding.

The shared electronic resources core appropriation increased to $950,000.

The MINTs program was expanded into eMINTS — enhancing Missouri's Instructional Networked Teaching Strategies. eMINTS put high-powered teachers in high-tech classrooms. Nearly 50 schools districts in Missouri participate in the program, which is funded through savings realized from the federal E-Rate program. For more information, see the eMINTS site.

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