[2] Richard Hooper was appointed its Director and operated with a small central team and the programme was administered by the Council for Educational Technology.
[4][5] The Department for Education and Science (DES) announced in 1972 the approval by then Secretary of State Margaret Thatcher of a "national development programme in computer assisted learning.
It required joint funding from the host establishment and stipulated effective evaluation and monitoring processes but allowed a significant degree of autonomy to the projects.
Hooper was supported by two assistant directors, Gillian Frewin (from ICL) and Roger Miles (from the Army School of Instructional Technology).
It supported some 35 projects, seven in schools, a number in higher education but the majority were based on the British armed services’ growing interest in developing more automated and managed approaches to training.
The hardware was limited; the computers were large expensive cabinets of complicated electronics accessed mainly by paper tape with Teletype printouts but already the focus was more on the way technology could be used to improve teaching and learning than as a subject in its own right.