A collaborative Montana partnership is bringing unique educational opportunities to K12 students throughout the state.

The group “We Are Montana in the Classroom” has organized and created an interactive virtual classroom that brings distance-learning to isolated rural and tribal communities across Montana.

And there are plenty of benefits from this new distance-learning venture.

More than 6500 students have been reached in the first year of this initiative, and from here it’s only growing.

It would take nearly 27 hours to drive from Missoula to all of these classrooms that are reached digitally, but because of this new technological undertaking, faculty and grad students from the University of Montana can bring interactive lessons to K12 students in real time.

March commemorated Brain Awareness Week, reaching several rural or tribal classrooms with a study of dinosaur brains and how it helps modern-day scientists in their research.

Other subjects covered in Brain Awareness Week included "Brains and Robots," "Sounds, Science and Brains,” and even a look at the science of concussions.

To keep these classrooms going, “We Are Montana in the Classroom” has partnered with “Inspired Classroom,” and is powered by “VisionNet,” a tech group based out of Great Falls.

The next series of classes is scheduled for April 18-22, and will look at Native American scholars, researchers, and change-makers at the University of Montana.