In the past, I have used a USENET newsgroup to handle student questions. There is a problem with USENET newsgroups such as ucsc.class.cmps109, and that is that the ucsc news server does not distribute those news groups outside of the ucsc domain. This means that students trying to read the newsgroup from a computer using a commercial ISP cannot read them.
There is a solution. UCSC now has some online class management software that includes a discussion group mechanism. It requires a separate login and is accessible from anywhere, using a standard web browser.
As soon as it is available I will let you know. Your login name will be the same as your cats username. Your initial password will be the first 4 letters of your LAST name and the LAST for digits of your student ID. If your last name has less than 4 letters than it will be your entire last name plus the last 4 digits of your student id. Using that information, follow this link to get to the WebCT Login Page.