Higher education tends to foster uses of virtual technology that "act on" students. Such an approach, which I call exclusionary participation, does not allow for an understanding of the range and kinds of public participation and multiple literacies and communities possible in the virtual sphere (Hawisher and LeBlanc, Stroupe).

Yet, more and more university mission statements are underscoring the importance of exposure to and learning in new media and technologies, particularly in the virtual sphere. However, the integration of technology involves an "add on" approach, where interaction is conventional and limited (such as class LISTSERVs, email with the instructor, or a component of Internet research for a paper). Virtual technology is limited to the roles of glorified television, telephone, and typewriter/word processor. Student participation is limited to gathering information, private communication, and word-processing.

For the last twenty years, compositionists have been actively teaching with computer technology, making composition studies the appropriate arena to address this "add on" problem. The following two ways highlight an "acting with" model of technology integration:

1. Teachers who teach in electronic classrooms need to prepare students to choose their means of participation in virtual sphere as well as to prepare them in the changing literacies, and
2. Teachers who teach in electronic classrooms need to reaffirm the democratizing aspects of virtual sphere by addressing the "add on" approach with their university colleagues through their work with cross-disciplinary teaching projects, symposia, and technology policy and procurement committees.