There is really no theoretical difference between standard education and distance education; the difference is in the mediation of the transactions between teachers and students. Distance education writing courses can be successful provided the instructor uses a strong text, states his or her guidelines clearly, tutors well on computer, and offers conferencing through the computer. An instructor, new to this type of instruction, sketched out his course, beginning with a syllabus and assignment plan that started with writing for a personal audience. Tutoring, including commenting on written assignments, is naturally more difficult in a distance environment since teachers cannot write comments and corrections directly on student papers. Instead, instructors might follow a few basic conventions such as bracketing difficult passages, writing a few interpolated remarks in capitals, and writing a few clearly marked global comments at the end. Much of the novelty of this approach lies in its attempt to combine composition-teaching practice with conversation-theory underpinnings in a computer mediated environment; the central activity of this system is conferencing, which encourages active and willing involvement as well as cognitive growth. It might include both asynchronous or e-mail/bulletin-board-type conversations as well as synchronous or real-time discussions. One of the most difficult parts of managing the course is communicating the goals and guidelines of the assignments. (Contains 15 references and three appendixes, including a diagram for distance education writing, an interview assignment, and comments on a student text.) (TB)