Published: January 1, 1997

Desert Rose

Sharon Hackley is a go-getter. The 58-year-old Kingman, Arizona, 6th grade teacher has co-authored a book on plants of the Southwest, published award-winning photos of African wildlife, and launched a nonprofit corporation to distribute a soil curriculum she developed. Just when you think you've heard about all her prizes, grants, and accomplishments, she mentions that she also plays bass clarinet in two orchestras. So it comes as no surprise to learn that Hackley recently took on a new challenge: She plunged into educational technology.

It certainly wasn't something Hackley had to do. She could have just cruised into retirement. But to hear Hackley tell it, technology jump-started a stagnating career. She was suffering burnout and considering stepping out of the classroom when the opportunity came to tackle something new.

"Computers—the word terrified me," she says. "I was absolutely the old-fashioned teacher." But that was before her former principal encouraged her to attend a 1993 teacher-training institute sponsored by Texaco and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and focused on creative educational applications for television. It was that workshop, she says, that gave her the confidence to think, "Maybe I can...