MINNEAPOLIS - The nation's public schools are rushing to reconfigure scores of traditional courses from basic composition to calculus so students can take them via the Internet. One of the unlikely new offerings in this vast experiment is online gym.

Sound like an oxymoron? Not in Minneapolis, where a physical education course joined the school district's growing online catalog in the spring and already has a waiting list.

"I've never seen a response like this to any course," said Frank Goodrich, a veteran football coach who is one of two instructors teaching online physical education this summer to about 60 high school students.

The course allows students to meet requirements by exercising how they want, when they want. They are required to work out hard for 30 minutes four times a week and report to their teachers by e-mail. Parents must certify that the students did the workouts.