In its two-year existence, the federally funded Staples Teacher Center (STC) in Minnesota has had a significant impact on improving classroom instruction and staff development activities in a rural setting, proving that teacher centers are a most effective delivery system for inservice education in sparsely populated areas. Services are rendered on an individual basis, with clients ranging from teachers and aides to administrators and to community members with educational concerns. Examples of STC involvement illustrate the variety of programs and sevices provided: (1) working with a high school art teacher to prepare a unit on lost-wax cast jewelry-making, and facilitating a Fine Arts day at an elementary school with 18 high school students; (2) assisting a high school social studies department in obtaining speakers and materials on local political activities; (3) providing an advisory program for experientially oriented classroom projects; and (4) performing research for a variety of classroom and administrative needs, from launching a hot air balloon to reporting on Japanese management styles. (FG)