Our Founders

Linda and Peter Jeschofnig are the founders of Hands-On Labs, Inc. (formerly At Home Science, Inc.). They began developing chemistry LabPaqs in 1994 to provide real-world, at-home, chemistry lab experiences for Peter's distance-learning students at Colorado Mountain College (CMC) in Glenwood Springs, CO. As they became more involved with distance education, they observed a lack of experiential lab opportunities for other distance-science courses.

Hands-On Labs, Inc. evolved from the Jeschofnig’s effort to fulfill the needs of CMC's distance education students. The college's primary mission is to offer its students "access to education." However, with students spread throughout a 12,000 square mile area, and separated by high passes in the Rocky Mountains, this was not an easy mission to fulfill! CMC utilized all the latest methodologies to offer a wide variety of "distance education" courses, but chemistry and hard sciences were previously not among those. As in most sciences, approved chemistry course credits are not normally available or transferable for a college degree if the class does not contain a "wet" lab component. Thus, chemistry, an important natural science, could not be offered to distance-education students when there was no way for them to attend a lab.

Peter believed micro-scale techniques could be adapted to allow safe and effective chemistry experimentation at home and in 1994, the Jeschofnig’s produced their first lab LabPaq called the ChemKit for Peter’s students. It didn’t take long for the ChemKit to become popular and soon Peter was approached by other professors requesting that he make the ChemKit available for their students. Linda, the business professor, then began collaborating with distance science professors in other disciplines.

Now, in collaboration with other distinguished distance educators, the Jeschofnigs have developed a wide array of effective laboratory LabPaqs in all the major sciences for distance-learning students at the college and high school levels. Over 80 different lab LabPaqs have been developed and are used by tens of thousands students worldwide each year.

The Jeschofnigs and their colleagues believe the valid study of every science requires hands-on experimentation and personal observations to effectively learn scientific concepts and to develop the logic, pragmatic, critical thinking skills which enhance effective decision making. Their opinions have been consistently supported by scientist around the world. Today, most educational institutions as well as science governing boards insist that the preponderance of science lab work be performed by hands-on experimentation.

As Fulbright Professors, Linda and Peter spent their 1995/1996 academic year teaching in Ethiopia under a Fulbright Grant. Peter taught graduate-level geochemistry, hydrology and environmental science at Addis Ababa University. Linda taught accounting at the Commercial College and conducted an extensive faculty development project to introduce Quality Education Principles and Practices to Ethiopian professors. They also spent their 2003/2004 sabbatical under a Fulbright grant, this time at the University of Namibia in Windhoek where they helped initiate a Distance-Learning program and trained faculty in the effective development, implementation, and teaching of distance education courses. While in Namibia, the Jeschofnigs demonstrated the practical applications of technology across the globe as they continued to teach web courses in Colorado from Africa.

The Jeschofnigs share this motto: "Adventure is intellectual curiosity in action!" They whole-heartedly believe in experiential learning and love to discover new things, travel to exotic places, meet new people, encounter different cultures, and share these experiences with friends and students.

These loves led them to develop and conduct Study-Abroad and Great Travels Programs for Colorado Mountain College. These programs combined field ecology classes with cultural and language studies. The trips included rainforest ecology in Costa Rica; marine biology in Galapagos; marine ecology in Belize; rainforest and marine ecology in Honduras; Amazon ecology plus Inca archaeology in Peru; and ambassador tours of China and Tibet. Although the Jeschofnigs no longer conduct these trips, the study abroad programs they established at Colorado Mountain College continue and are open to all life-long-learners as well as traditional college-age students.