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The teaching and learning of surgery is a time-honored tradition based upon the "see one, do one, teach one" apprenticeship model. Recent improvement of this model has centered upon incremental change in skills teaching and testing and curricular development. Economic pressures have strained the resources of academic health centers and faculty responsible for teaching surgery, even as information technology has opened new avenues for obtaining and benefitting from relevant information. Combining the tools of simulation theory, virtual reality, and the principles of adult education offers new opportunities to optimize surgical education as we enter a more highly connected and interdependent era, where the boundaries between teacher and student blur as the modern surgeon truly becomes a lifelong learner., (Copyright 2000 Wiley-Liss, Inc.)