In 1999 the Greater Saskatoon Catholic Schools executive council which was comprised of five superintendents, each responsible for the programming and personnel in his or her geographic area of the city, and the assistant director and director of education recognized the change in their students and the pressure to meet the demand for change. Recognition fuelled action and so began the development of the Saskatoon Catholic Cyber School, which would have the potential to meet the needs of students in the global context by providing relevant education using current technologies. The teaching staff for the online school was recruited because of their content expertise within courses rather than their facility with technology. All teaching staff was and is part-time and has taught conventional classes in the school division. Tunison and Noonan (2001) explained it best, “a course development model in which teachers developed empathy for students' frustrations as they worked on-line, each teacher was required to develop both the content and the technological aspects of the courses.”

By August of 2000 the first four courses were ready to be delivered to students. During this first year of online course offerings, a total of 156 students took advantage of this educational opportunity. "The revolution has begun… …it can't be stopped. So rather than being beaten down by the technology, teachers must use it, use it, use it, and use it again to do what school is supposed to be about - learning about life and the world around us." Regan (2002) With very little advertising the school grew rapidly. The students were sharing their cyber experiences with their peers and by August 2001, 8 courses were ready and 310 students enrolled. The 2002-2003 school year offered 16 courses and had an enrollment of 559 students. In this, the 2003-2004 school year, there are now 19 courses and the semester one numbers have doubled from those of last year. Projected enrollment for the year is over 800 students.

In determining course curricula there was a clear expectation that all online courses would meet the requirements of the governing body for education in the province (Saskatchewan Education, 1999). Every course is linked directly to the foundational curricular document for its subject area. The curriculum serves as a blueprint for the course itself and was seen as a primary resource in course creation from the outset. In addition the provincial Department of Education has outlined their philosophy of distance education (Thompson, 2001) and every effort has been made to ensure the courses created in the Saskatoon Catholic Cyber School meet these catholic philosophical standards for excellence.