Leonard Evenchik:

Wizard of Distance Education at DCE

Leonard Evenchik with some of the distance education multimedia equipment

As a teenager growing up in Lorraine, Ohio (a small town located 12 miles from the Oberlin College campus), Leonard Evenchik's first encounter with computers occurred when he entered tenth grade: "One of my fondest memories of high school is teaching other students how to use one of the first computers of its day, the IBM 1620, which took over a large classroom at the school." Now decades after dealing with technology that predates personal computers, Evenchik, director of distance and innovative education for Harvard University's Division of Continuing Education, presides over hardware and software that's considerably more sophisticated--one that has extended the reach of Extension School courses to distant audiences using streaming internet video and multimedia technologies.

This past year Evenchik directed the production of 24 distance ed courses, ranging from such advanced computer science subjects as Dr. Joseph Marks's CSCI E-207 Theory of Computation and Its Applications to more traditional humanities courses such as Professor Gregory Nagy's CLAS E-116 Introduction to Greek Literature: Concepts of the Hero. These two dozen courses enrolled more than 2,000 students, some of whom were living thousands of miles away from the Harvard campus in Cambridge, where most of the courses were taught in front of live audiences. Registered students were able to attend, virtually, the lectures and to participate in all aspects in the courses from anywhere in the world where they could use a reliable internet connection.

"This year saw a very impressive expansion in our course offerings, especially when you consider that just four years ago we offered only one distance education course as an experiment," stated Dean Henry Leitner, senior lecturer on computer science and assistant dean for information technology at the Harvard Division of Continuing Education. "In fact, it's no coincidence that the initial course offering was, in fact, Len Evenchik's Extension School course Data Communications and Internet Protocols."

According to Dean Michael Shinagel, Evenchik was a natural choice to head up distance education. "Len had been teaching at the Extension School for a number of years, and had worked successfully for several high-tech companies since he graduated from MIT." In fact, Evenchik earned three degrees from MIT, and by a quirk of circumstances, all three were awarded to him at the same commencement ceremony in 1979. "I received a bachelor of science in computer science, another bachelor of science in management, and a master's in electrical engineering. After the president of MIT handed me my third diploma he asked in a loud voice: 'Is that it? Are you done?'" Following a brief stint at AT&T's Bell Laboratories, Evenchik went to work on satellite communication systems and other internet-based systems for the ARPAnet (the precursor of today's Internet), which was then being managed by Bolt, Beranek and Newman, Inc. (BBN).

After five years at BBN, Evenchik's career turned to consulting for high-technology companies--and a lot of travel. "After I met my future wife, I felt that traveling was not as much fun as it had been, so I went to work for the largest user of voice and data networks in Massachusetts, which turned out to be the state government." He stayed on as director of data communications for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts for nearly five years; his most highly publicized moment occurred when he discovered major overcharges in the manner the state was being billed for its local phone calls. His diligence in uncovering the errant charges resulted in a refund to the state of several million dollars, a story that was featured in Boston-area newspapers and television reports. (Evenchik is no stranger to being featured in the media; more than one year ago, Newsweek magazine did a feature story on distance education in which he was quoted. More recently, he appeared on WGBH's Greater Boston television show and was interviewed by the program's host, Emily Rooney.)

He left his job with the state when he was struck with the desire to get involved again with start-up companies. He worked at both Agile Networks and Netcentric Corporation, where he managed cutting-edge technologies. In 1998 Dean Leitner phoned him about a new distance education initiative, and he consulted for the Division of Continuing Education in a pro bono fashion for more than a year before officially joining the Division.

This past year saw not only significant growth in the number of courses that were offered via distance, but also some interesting innovations in the types of courses that were produced. A case in point is CSCI E-135 Network Programming taught by H. T. Kung, William H. Gates professor of computer science and electrical engineering at Harvard. Professor Kung is one of the most prominent figures in the field of computer networks, telecommunications, and electronic commerce, and a very busy individual. Evenchik and Leitner gave Professor Kung a chance to offer his highly regarded Harvard College course to the adult Extension School audience using distance education technologies.

Working closely with Professor Kung's head teaching fellow, Dr. Mark Gaynor, Evenchik and his team were able to produce Kung's lectures--which were taught during the daytime to a live audience of mostly Harvard College undergraduates--and make them available to Extension School students.

Evenchik has made a conscious decision to spend the next couple of years focusing on improving the quality of the distance education experience and on adding features that will enhance the overall sophistication of the distance education format. Toward this end, the Extension School recently was awarded a sizable grant from Harvard University's Office of the Provost to build "student-centered enhancements for learning at a distance."

Antonio Aranda Eggermont, James Peregrino, and Colin Kegler

The overarching goals in this research and development effort are fourfold: First, to foster real-time and non-real-time collaboration and communication between students and also between students and the teaching staff, including the issues of how to better deal with the spontaneous ideas and contributions of distant students; second, to integrate more easily material that is presented in live class meetings to a distant audience; third, to leverage resources within Harvard (such as the University's electronic "gateways" for internet-based video) and to transfer the Extension School's growing expertise to other departments and schools within the University; and fourth, to extend the Extension School's formative evaluation efforts and automatically feed relevant information back to instructors and teaching fellows so that they can improve their pedagogy. Evenchik is confident of success in these endeavors, and is in the process of adding technical and managerial expertise to his growing domain.

"I've been fortunate to work with some outstanding individuals over the past year, particularly Antonio Aranda Eggermont, Colin Kegler, and James Peregrino, without whom we could never have streamed so much course content on a weekly basis," he remarks. He is now in the process of adding two or three new members to his talented team and looks forward to the new facilities that are being built at 53 Church Street, which will feature classrooms and other facilities to support the needs of the Harvard Extension School's distance education program.

Photo by Jeffry Pike.