So while we know that there are incredible applications for emergent technologies such as VR/AR, the goal for organizations isn’t to look to implement these types of solutions immediately while in the midst of a pandemic, adding layers of training and cost concerns to the already existing uncertainty. Rather, an approach that involves short and long term planning as well as data collection to inform decision making is a much more prudent approach.
UCLA Extension seeks XR (augmented and virtual reality) professionals to teach in a new online certificate program housed within the UCLA Extension Center for Immersive Media. This recruitment is for online instructors for remote and asynchronous instruction, three hours per week, for ten-week quarters.
The center is focused on enterprise applications, workforce training in XR, narrative structures for XR storytelling, and (UX) User Experience in XR. This XR program is focused on training individuals to become XR content developers. The emphasis of this certificate is not on advanced coding or hardware development. Areas of recruitment include:
XR Frameworks, an introduction to the XR business, user cases & goal/needs evaluation
XR Tools I, an introduction to a modeling software such as Blender
XR Tools II, prototyping tools with an emphasis on Unity
XR Narratives, the use of non-linear narrative structures in XR development
XR User Experience I, usability applications and studies bringing together previous class course work into VR and XR projects
XR User Experience II, advanced XR experience studies and applications
XR Product Pipeline & Project Management, Best practices including stages of production, critical paths, etc.
XR Capstone Project, creation of final portfolio piece UCLA Extension is the open-access, self-supporting continuing education division of UCLA. The Department of the Arts offers a wide variety of certificate programs and courses, including post-baccalaureate credit-bearing (400-level), continuing education (CEU) credit, and non-credit bearing general interest courses. Course disciplines in the Visual Arts span subject areas such as Design Communication Arts, User Experience, Photography, Studio Arts and Art History. Our courses and certificate programs offer students the opportunity to learn from highly qualified practitioners who are passionate about teaching. Applications to teach are accepted throughout the year in order to fill immediate program needs and to increase the depth of the instructor pool, but interviews will only be scheduled with qualified applicants who can fill anticipated openings. XR Instructor Qualified applicants possessing current industry knowledge and experience in the following topic area(s) are encouraged to apply: AR, VR, MR, XR, User Experience Design, Gaming, Immersive Interface Design, XR Research, Software (Unity, Blender), XR Hardware. Classes are currently online only. Two formats are available: asynchronous, or live Zoom lectures. Each course is 11 weeks, enrollment limited to 20 students. Instructor Duties: • Develop or update course syllabus to meet campus approval requirements, in consultation with the UCLA Extension Program Director and Program Manager. • Use subject-matter expertise to impart knowledge to students and leverage additional resources appropriately to enhance the curriculum (i.e. make arrangements for guest speakers, etc.) • Design interactive and motivational classroom activities to fully engage participants and to reinforce student learning. • Update materials periodically, and regularly monitor course evaluations in order to make adjustments and improvements to the curriculum. • Respond to student questions and learning needs in a timely manner. • Communicate with Program Director and Program Staff in a timely manner. • Complete required administrative tasks in a timely manner including: completing all new hire paperwork, submitting updated quarterly syllabus, posting bio and photo on the UCLA Extension website, accepting quarterly contract, submitting required textbook orders, and communicating classroom needs to the appropriate people. • Participate in required orientations and instructor training programs. • Employ culturally competent teaching methodologies in the classroom inclusive of both domestic and international student populations. • Stay current regarding the professional body of knowledge in the field • Respond to student inquiries about final grades and consult with Program Director as needed. • Maintain a record of final grades for up to 13 months following the last class session. Qualifications: • Creation of XR products, with portfolio examples and specific role(s) in producing • 3-5 years industry experience • Commitment to the highest level of academic standards and integrity. • Current knowledge of and demonstrated proficiency in subject area. • Highly effective oral and written communication skills, including the ability to convey conceptual and complex ideas and information. • Outstanding interpersonal skills and high emotional intelligence. • Proficiency in or willingness to learn the use of instructional technology and online teaching tools. • College-level and/or continuing education teaching experience preferred. • Experience designing curriculum and measuring student performance preferred.
UCLA Extension is considered one of the top programs of its kind, offering to more than 35,000 students per year approximately 4,500 classes and non-degree certificate programs to meet the professional development, continuing education and personal enrichment needs of the full spectrum of nontraditional students as well as companies and organizations throughout and beyond the Los Angeles region.
Special Conditions of Employment
Instructors are hired on a quarterly contract basis.
Because Extension is a division of UCLA, all Extension degree-credit instructors and courses must be formally approved according to the regulations of the Academic Senate of the University of California. Eligibility to teach a course is contingent upon this formal academic approval. Once approved, teaching assignments are “by agreement.” The Instructor’s Contract outlines the deliverables for the course, the course schedule, and the compensation terms, subject to Extension policies and procedures. UCLA Extension makes no commitment to hire an instructor until it has sent and received a signed
Instructor Contract. Should the course section an instructor plans to teach be cancelled for any reason, the Instructor Contract, including rights to compensation for future section meetings, is voided.
In an effort to promote and maintain a healthy environment for our students, visitors and employees, UCLA is a smoke-free site. Smoking is prohibited within the boundaries of all UCLA owned, occupied, leased, and associated building and facilities. UCLA Extension is an Equal Opportunity Employer that values a diverse workforce.
To Apply:
Please follow the “apply now” link to submit the following:
Completed application form
Current CV
Link to portfolio or work samples if available
Cover letter”
Basic qualifications (required at time of application)
Creation of XR products, with portfolio examples and specific role(s) in producing
3-5 years industry experience
Commitment to the highest level of academic standards and integrity.
Current knowledge of and demonstrated proficiency in subject area.
Highly effective oral and written communication skills, including the ability to convey conceptual and complex ideas and information.
Outstanding interpersonal skills and high emotional intelligence.
Proficiency in or willingness to learn the use of instructional technology and online
teaching tools.
College-level and/or continuing education teaching experience preferred.
Experience designing curriculum and measuring student performance preferred.
Nurse’s Escape is a VR game that simulates an escape room based on the five stages of the Sepsis Bundle. The purpose is to supplement nurse’s lecture-style curriculum with an interactive way to test nurse’s Sepsis knowledge. Sepsis is one of the leading causes of deaths and hospitalizations yearly, so equipping nurses with the right skills and information to treat sepsis in a timely manner can save lives and money. Help treat the millionaire’s illness before time runs out!
This game is sponsored by the University of Nebraska Medical Center’s College of Nursing-Lincoln.
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Australian hospitals leveraging VR tech to fast-track clinician training
It only takes 10 minutes to practice a procedure in a session through a VR platform such as Vantari VR.
Using flight-simulator technology, Vantari VR provides medical training using a VR headset and laptop. Its modules cover 90% of medical procedures as part of doctors’ core training and deliver steps that are recommended by college guidelines.
In Fiona Stanley Hospital, for example, over 20 registrars have been educated to perform chest drain insertions.
Vantari VR was awarded a $100,000 grant from Epic Games, the American video game company behind the online game Fortnite. Presently, the startup seeks to raise $2 million from a funding round that will close in August.
Virtual Reality (VR) training tools are here to help, ensuring that healthcare professionals can be trained remotely, immersively, and more thoroughly than traditional methods for both front-line medicine and in specialist procedures.
Their VR platform uses personalized prediction software and “gamification and varied content formats to engage users and embed knowledge”, and has been used to “deliver typically labor-intensive training quickly and at scale”
“VR enables medics to immerse themselves in these infrequent scenarios, and can reduce skill fade by 52% and improve learning retention rates by up to 75% (compared to 10% for traditional methods),”
Simulated virtual learning can also ease the psychological burden of notoriously intensive medical training and place more emphasis on wellbeing.
The use of AR/VR in educational settings is on the rise, paving the way for new careers and a workforce trained to embrace technology.
If projections stay on track, the global spending on educational AR/VR is expected to rise from $1.8 billion to $12.6 billion over the next four years.
the International Data Corporation (IDC) released a report indicating that the pandemic has fueled an impressive forecast of worldwide expenditures on AR/VR, which are expected to grow from $12 billion in 2020 to $72.8 billion by 2024.
rom completing spinal surgery to training at a high-tech facility, such as the University of Nebraska Medical Center’s Davis Global Center, which has AR/VR and holographic technologies among its many offerings.
The 7th International Conference of the Immersive Learning Research Network (iLRN 2021) will be an innovative and interactive virtual gathering for a strengthening global network of researchers and practitioners collaborating to develop the scientific, technical, and applied potential of immersive learning. It is the premier scholarly event focusing on advances in the use of virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), mixed reality (MR), and other extended reality (XR) technologies to support learners across the full span of learning–from K-12 through higher education to work-based, informal, and lifelong learning contexts.
Following the success of iLRN 2020, our first fully online and in-VR conference, this year’s conference will once again be based on the iLRN Virtual Campus, powered by VirBELA, but with a range of activities taking place on various other XR simulation, gaming, and other platforms. Scholars and professionals working from informal and formal education settings as well as those representing diverse industry sectors are invited to participate in the conference, where they may share their research findings, experiences, and insights; network and establish partnerships to envision and shape the future of XR and immersive technologies for learning; and contribute to the emerging scholarly knowledge base on how these technologies can be used to create experiences that educate, engage, and excite learners.
Note: Last year’s iLRN conference drew over 3,600 attendees from across the globe, making the scheduling of sessions a challenge. This year’s conference activities will be spread over a four-week period so as to give attendees more opportunities to participate at times that are conducive to their local time zones.
##### TOPIC AREAS #####
XR and immersive learning in/for:
Serious Games • 3D Collaboration • eSports • AI & Machine Learning • Robotics • Digital Twins • Embodied Pedagogical Agents • Medical & Healthcare Education • Workforce & Industry • Cultural Heritage • Language Learning • K-12 STEM • Higher Ed & Workforce STEM • Museums & Libraries • Informal Learning • Community & Civic Engagement • Special Education • Geosciences • Data Visualization and Analytics • Assessment & Evaluation
##### SUBMISSION STREAMS & CATEGORIES #####
ACADEMIC STREAM (Refereed paper published in proceedings):
– Full (6-8 pages) paper for oral presentation
– Short paper (4-5 pages) for oral presentation
– Work-in-progress paper (2-3 pages) for poster presentation
– Doctoral colloquium paper (2-3 pages)
PRACTITIONER STREAM (Refereed paper published in proceedings):
– Oral presentation
– Poster presentation
– Guided virtual adventures
– Immersive learning project showcase
NONTRADITIONAL SESSION STREAM (1-2 page extended abstract describing session published in proceedings):
– Workshop
– Special session
– Panel session
##### SESSION TYPES & SESSION FORMATS #####
– Oral Presentation: Pre-recorded video + 60-minute live in-world discussion with
others presenting on similar/related topics (groupings of presenters into sessions determined by Program Committee)
– Poster Presentation: Live poster session in 3D virtual exhibition hall; pre-recorded video optional
– Doctoral Colloquium: 60-minute live in-world discussion with other doctoral researchers; pre-recorded video optional
– Guided Virtual Adventures: 60-minute small-group guided tours of to various social and collaborative XR/immersive environments and platforms
– Immersive Learning Project Showcase: WebXR space to assemble a collection of virtual artifacts, accessible to attendees throughout the conference
– Workshop: 1- or 2-hour live hands-on session
– Special Session: 30- or 60-minute live interactive session held in world; may optionally be linked to one or more papers
– Panel Session: 60-minute live in-world discussion with a self-formed group of 3-5 panelists (including a lead panelist who serves as a moderator)
Please see the conference website for templates and guidelines.
##### PROGRAM TRACKS #####
Papers and proposals may be submitted to one of 10 program tracks, the first nine of which correspond to the iLRN Houses of application, and the tenth of which is intended for papers making knowledge contributions to the learning sciences, computer science, and/or game studies that are not linked to any particular application area:
Track 1. Assessment and Evaluation (A&E)
Track 2. Early Childhood Development & Learning (ECDL)
Track 4. Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, Access, & Social Justice (IDEAS)
Track 5. K-12 STEM Education
Track 6. Language, Culture, & Heritage (LCH)
Track 7. Medical & Healthcare Education (MHE)
Track 8. Nature & Environmental Sciences (NES)
Track 9. Workforce Development & Industry Training (WDIT)
Track 10. Basic Research and Theory in Immersive Learning (not linked to any particular application area)
##### PAPER/PROPOSAL SUBMISSION & REVIEW #####
Papers for the Academic Stream and extended-abstract proposals for the Nontraditional Session Stream must be prepared in standard IEEE double-column US Letter format using Microsoft Word or LaTeX, and will be accepted only via the online submission system, accessible via the conference website (from which guidelines and templates are also available).
Proposals for the Practitioner Stream are to be submitted via an online form, also accessible from the conference website.
A blind peer-review process will be used to evaluate all submissions.
##### IMPORTANT DATES #####
– Main round submission deadline – all submission types welcome: 2021-01-15
– Notification of review outcomes from main submission round: 2021-04-01
– Late round submission deadline – Work-in-progress papers, practitioner presentations, and nontraditional sessions only: 2021-04-08
– Camera-ready papers for proceedings due – Full and short papers: 2021-04-15
– Presenter registration deadline – Full and short papers (also deadline for early-bird registration rates): 2021-04-15
– Notification of review outcomes from late submission round: 2021-04-19
– Camera-ready work-in-progress papers and nontraditional session extended abstracts for proceedings due; final practitioner abstracts for conference program due: 2021-05-03
– Deadline for uploading presentation materials (videos, slides for oral presentations, posters for poster presentations): 2021-05-10
– Conference opening: 2021-05-17
– Conference closing: 2021-06-10
*Full and short papers can only be submitted in the main round.
##### PUBLICATION & INDEXING #####
All accepted and registered papers in the Academic Stream that are presented at iLRN 2021 and all extended abstracts describing the Nontraditional Sessions presented at the conference will be published in the conference proceedings and submitted to the IEEE Xplore(r) digital library.
Content loaded into Xplore is made available by IEEE to its abstracting and indexing partners, including Elsevier (Scopus, EiCompendex), Clarivate Analytics (CPCI–part of Web of Science) and others, for potential inclusion in their respective databases. In addition, the authors of selected papers may be invited to submit revised and expanded versions of their papers for possible publication in the IEEE Transactions on Learning Technologies (2019 JCR Impact Factor: 2.714), the Journal of Universal Computer Science (2019 JCR Impact Factor: 0.91), or another Scopus and/or Web of Science-indexed journal, subject to the relevant journal’s regular editorial and peer-review policies and procedures.
##### CONTACT #####
Inquiries regarding the iLRN 2020 conference should be directed to the Conference Secretariat at conference@immersivelrn.org.
mounting research suggests that gaming in immersive virtual environments can directly affect and impact regions of the brain responsible for memory, spatial orientation, information organizations, and fine motor skills.
the ICRC officially established its Virtual Reality Unit (VRU) to delve further into computer-generated environments as a way to educate, communicate and advocate respect for IHL.
By 2017, the VRU had amassed a library of virtual environments for FAS’ IHL training sessions but there was a desire within the VRU, as well as in FAS and ICRC’s Learning & Development, to develop more advanced VR opportunities for a wider audience.
A 2018 report researched global financial investment in XR and a 2019 meta-analysis consolidated global academic findings that used VR to measure behaviour.
December 2019 … the production of an XR Quick Start Guide in April 2020 which introduces ICRC staff to lessons learned and best practices for initiative development.
Since 1992 I have been teaching a course on how to write electronics section. My students include freshman, writing majors, and media lab graduate students.
As I watch the yearly growth in ingenuity among my students, I find myself anticipating a new kind of storyteller, one who is half hacker, half bard. The spirit of the hacker is one of the great creative wellspring Safari time, causing the in animate circuits to sync with ever more individualized and quirky voices; the spirit of the bard is eternal and irreplaceable, telling us what we are doing here in about we mean to one another.
Set 600 years from now, describes a society that science has dehumanized by eliminating love, parenthood, and the family in favor of generating engineering, test tube delivery, and state indoctrination. Books are banned, and science has come up with a substitute form of storytelling to delete the masses.
p. 20 Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451
p. 22 this accounts of a digital dystopia but eroticize and demonize the computer. Cyberpunks surfers are like Cowboys on the new frontier motorcycle hoodlums with a joystick in their hand instead of a motorcycle between their legs. They are outlaw pirates on an endless voyage of exploration throughout the virtual world riding and plundering among the invisible data hoards of the world in many states by the stronger pirate parents who reach in and reprogram their minds.
p. 22 William Gibson Neurmancer
p. 28 The Harbinger on the the Holodeck
The technical in economic cultivation of this freestyle new medium of communication has led to several new varieties of narrative entertainment. This new storytelling formats very from the shoot them up video game in the virtual dungeons of Internet role-playing games to the post modern literary hypertext. This wide range of narrative art holds the promise of a new medium of expression that is S varied SD printed book or the movie picture.
Books printed before 1501 or cold incunabula; the word is derived from the Latin for swaddling clothes and is used to indicate that this books are the work of a technology still in its infancy.
The garish video games in tangled websites of the current digital environment or part of a similar period of technical evolution, part of a similar struggle for the conventions of coherent communication.
p. 29 now, in the incunabular days of the narrative computer. We can see how 20th century novels, films, and please have been steadily pushing against the boundaries of linear storytelling. We therefore have to start our survey of the harbingers of the holiday back with a look at multiform stories, that is, linear narrative straining against the boundary of pre-digital media like a two dimensional picture trying to burst of its frame.
p. 30 The multiform story
Frank Capra’s It’s a wonderful life
p. 34 Robert Zemeskis Back to the Future
p. 35 Harold Ramis’s Groundhog Day
Multi forms stories often reflect different points of view of the same event. p. 37 Kurosawa Rashomon, the same crime is narrated by four different people: a rape victim; her husband, who is murdered; the bandit who attacked them; and a bystander.
p. 37 Milorad Pavic’s Dictionary of the Khazars
p. 37 Multi form narrative attempts to give a simultaneous form to this possibilities, to allow us to hold in our minds at the same time multiple contradictory alternatives.
p. 38 active audience
When the writer expands the story to include multiple possibilities, the reader assumes a more active role.
p. 40 although television viewers have long been accused of being less active engaged in readers or theatergoers, research on thin culture provides considerable evidence that viewers actively appropriate the stories of their favorite series. In addition to sharing critical commentary and gossip, fans create their own stories by taking characters and situations from the series and developing them in ways closer to their own concerns.
p. 42 role playing games or theatrical in a non-traditional but thrilling way. Players are both actors and audience for one another, and events the purple tree often have the media seat of personal experience.
p. 43 Live theater has been incorporating the same qualities of spontaneity and audience involvement for some time.
p. 43 MUDs have allowed distant players on the Internet to share a common virtual space in which they can chat with one another in real time. A the social psychologist Sherry Turkle has persuasively demonstrated, mods are intensely “evocative” environments for fantasy play that allow people to create and sustain elaborate fictional personas.
p. 44 movies three dimensions
p. 51 dramatic storytelling in electronic games
p. 55 story webs
p. 59 computer scientist as storytellers
p. 65 Chapter 3 From Additive to Expressive Form
beyond multimedia
Sept 28, 1895 Arrival of the Train at La Ciotat Station
p. 66 photoplays
p. 67 one of the lessons we can learn from the history of film is that additive formulations like photo play or the contemporary catshall ‘multimedia” or a sign that the medium is in an early stage of development and it is still depending on the format derived from earlier technologies instead of exploiting its own expressive power. Today the derivative mindset is apparent in the conception of cyber space is the place to view “pages” of print or “clips” of moving video end of cedar rooms is offering “extended books.”
p. 60 ELIZA, 1966 Joseph Weizenbaum
p. 71 the four essential properties of digital environments
Digital environments are procedural
Digital environments are participatory
Digital environments are spacial
Digital environments are encyclopedic
p. 90 Digital structures of complexity
p. 95 part to the aesthetics of the medium
chapter 4 immersion
definition
The experience of being transported to an elaborate please simulator please it’s pleasurable in itself regarding of the fantasy contact. we Refer to this experience as immersion. Immersion is a metaphorical term derived from the physical experience of being submerged in water. We seek the same feeling from a psychologically immersive experience that we do from a plunge in the ocean or swimming pool: the sensation of being surrounded by a completely other reality, as different is water is from air, that takes over all of our attention, our whole perceptual apparatus.
p/ 99 entering the enchanted place
my note: ghost in the machine The computer itself, even without any fantasy content, is an enchanted object. Sometimes it can act like an autonomous, animate being, sensing it’s environment in carrying out internally generated processes, yet it can also seem like an extension of our own consciousness, capturing our words through the keyboard in displaying them on the screen as fast as we can thank them.
p. 110 the active creation of belief
In digital environments we have new opportunities to practice this active creation of belief. For instance, in an interactive video program set in Paris that may research group designed in the 1980s for language learners, we included a working telephone, represented by a photograph of a phone who’s keypad could be clicked on .
p. 112 structuring participation with a mask .
p. 119 regulating arousal According to Winnicott, “the pleasurable element in playing Carris whit eight employee Kasian that the instructional a razzle is not excessive”; that is, the object of the imaginary world should not be too enticing, scary, or real let the immersive trance be broken. This is true in any medium. If a horror movie is too frightening, we cover our eyes or turn away from the screen.
p. 126 chapter Agency
Agency is the satisfying power to take meaningful action and see the results of our decisions and choices. We expect to feel agency on the computer when we double click on a file and seat open before us or when we enter numbers in a spreadsheet and see the totals readjust. However, we do not usually expect to experience agency within a narrative environment.
p. 129 the pleasures of navigation
One form of agency not dependent on the game structure yet characteristic of digital environment is spatial navigation. The ability to move through virtual landscapes can be pleasurable in itself, independent of the content of the spaces.
p. 130 the story of the maze
the adventure maze embodies a classic fair-tale narrative of danger and salvation. as a format for electronic narrative, the maze is a more active version of the immersive visit (chapter 4).
p. 134 Giving Shape to Anxiety
p. 137 The Journey Story and the Pleasure of Problem Solving
