This proposal describes PREPnet, the Pennsylvania Research and Economic Partnership Network, which presently links thirty- nine colleges, universities, government, and private sector research and education enterprises to each other and to the NSFNET, a high speed (1.5 - 45 million bits per second) National Backbone network. PREPnet plans to expand its capacity for connecting education and research institutions and to extend its services into new regions of the state. This should encourage smaller institutions to take advantage of information resources available on PREPnet itself or through the NSFNET. The items proposed for NSF support include: -Expansion of Pittsburgh and Philadelphia network hubs; -Creation of a new network hub in State College, PA; -Creation of a new network hub in Meadville, PA; -Terminal servers for connecting very small member institutions at a reasonable cost; -Personnel for outreach, marketing, and support of new members; and -Compensation to the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center for NSFNET gateway and network support services.
