How to make a "free webhost"

I'm teaching an HTML class this Fall and would like to setup hosting for student's work on the school's server which is hosted by dreamhost. Last year I had the students sign up for an account on freehostia.com and it was a mess. Student's couldn't sign up, other's would never get a return from their "forgot password" and so on.

Does anyone know of any software that would make this easier or some alternatives that I might be missing?

thanks

You can always set up a subdomain under an FTP account for each student. i.e. 30 FTP users with 30 corresponding subdomains.

Or, still with 30 FTP users, but remap a specified directory to show up as a subdirectory under your domain.
http://wiki.dreamhost.com/KB_/_Account_Control_Panel_/_Domains_::_Remap_Sub-Dir

-Scott