International Summit Spotlight: Charlie Fink

February 7, 2020February 7, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / Leave a comment

We are proud to announce that Charlie Fink, author, columnist for Forbes magazine, and Adjunct Faculty member of Chapman University, will be presenting “Setting the Table for the Next Decade in XR,” discussing the future of this innovative and immersive technology, at the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit. He will be speaking in AltspaceVR on Tuesday, February 18 at 11:00 AM PST / 2:00 PM EST / 7:00 PM UK/GMT.

Charlie Fink is a long-time expert and evangelist in VR. We hope he brings his crystal ball (or the time vortex) with him as he explores what we should expect from the next ten years of immersive technology in VR, AR, and XR. He is a former Disney, AOL and AG Interactive executive who writes a popular column about XR for Forbes, and consultant to some of the leading companies in the space. As a 27 year old junior executive at Disney, Fink famously came up with the idea for The Lion King. In the 1990s, he was EVP & COO of VR pioneer Virtual World Entertainment. Variety calls him “XR’s explainer-in-chief.”

We are eager for him to share his expertise, experience, and what he sees in his crystal ball, and welcome you to join us during this ground-breaking International Summit.

To Attend the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit is February 17-22. It features over 170 speakers in 150+ events across multiple social and educational platforms including AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, rumii, Mozilla Hubs, and Somnium Space. Continue reading →

International Summit Spotlight: Tom Furness

February 7, 2020February 7, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / 1 Comment

We are so excited to announce that right after the “Rock In the Summit” opening ceremonies for the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit, Monday, February 17, at 2:00 PM PST / 5:00 PM EST / 10:00 PM UK/GMT in AltspaceVR, Professor Tom Furness will be our keynote speaker.

Tom Furness will also be on a panel called “Vision of the Future” with Gabriel Rene, Anson Ho, and Charlie Fink, hosted by Daniel Dyboski-Bryant in ENGAGE, Wednesday, February 19 at 1:30 PM – 2:30 PM PST / 4:30 PM EST / 9:30 PM UK/GMT.

Presenting at 3:30 PM PST / 6:30 PM EST / 11:30 PM UK/GMT, Tom Furness will discuss “Playing with Fire.” Over a career spanning 53 years, Prof. Furness has explored and developed technologies for getting bandwidth between humans and computing machines. His work has encompassed fighter cockpits, virtual reality, retinal displays, educational tools, medical simulators, pain, phobias, molecular modeling, scanning fiber endoscopes and entertainment systems. This quest has been punctuated with side trips and ‘aha’ experiences that led to unanticipated destinations. Dr. Furness plans to talk about lessons learned on his journey including unexpected delights – with a focus on the potential of VR to set minds on fire for education and training applications.

Tom Furness is the founder of the Virtual World Society, and a pioneer in human interface technology and virtual reality. He is widely known as the ‘grandfather of virtual reality.’ He received the B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Duke University and the Ph.D. in Engineering and Applied Science from the University of Southampton, England. Dr. Furness is currently a professor of Industrial Engineering with adjunct professorships in Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, and Human-Centered Design and Engineering at the University of Washington. Educators in VR celebrated the life of this amazing pioneer recently.

Furness is the founder of the Human Interface Technology Laboratory (HIT Lab) at UW and founder and international director of the HIT Lab NZ at the University of Canterbury, Christchurch, NZ and the HIT Lab Australia at the University of Tasmania, Launceston, Tasmania. He is also an Erskine Fellow and Adjunct Professor at the University of Canterbury and the University of Tasmania.

Prior to joining the faculty at the University, Dr. Furness served a combined 23 years as an U.S. Air Force officer and civilian at the Armstrong Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, where he developed advanced cockpits and virtual interfaces for the Department of Defense. He is the author of the Super Cockpit program and served as the Chief of Visual Display Systems and Super Cockpit Director until he joined the University of Washington in 1989.

Dr. Furness lectures widely and has appeared in many national and international network and syndicated television science and technology documentaries and news programs. He is the inventor of the personal eyewear display, the virtual retinal display, the HALO display and holds 25 patents in advanced sensor, virtual display and interface technologies. With his colleagues Dr. Furness has started 27 companies, two of which are traded on NASDAQ at a market capitalization of > $ 10 B. In 1998 he received the Discover Award for his invention of the virtual retinal display and in 2013 the SPIE Prism Award for the invention of the ChromaID technology. He has also received the Proto Award, the IEEE VRTG Career Award, and the AWE Lifetime Achievement Award. He is the founder and chairman of the Virtual World Society, a non-profit for extending virtual reality as a learning system for families and other humanitarian applications. He is a fellow in the IEEE.

We are honored to have Professor Furness speak at the Educators in VR International Summit.

To Attend the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit

The event requires no registration, and is virtual only, free, and open to the public. Platform access is required, so please install one of the above platforms to attend the International Summit. You may attend in 2D on a desktop or laptop computer with a headphone and microphone (USB gaming headphone recommended), or with a virtual device such as the Oculus Go, Quest, and Rift, Vive, and other mobile and tethered devices. Please note the specifications and requirements of each platform.

The majority of our events are on AltspaceVR. AltspaceVR is available for Samsung Gear, Steam Store for HTC Vive, Windows Mixed Reality, and the Oculus Store for Rift, Go and Quest users. Download and install the 2D version for use on your Windows desktop computer.

Educators in VR is a social, member organization dedicated to providing educational events, trainings, and workshops for educators and learners to prepare them for the future of spatial technologies in education. We offer free weekly workshops in AltspaceVR and other platforms. We need your help to fund this International Summit as well as our ongoing educational programs, workshops, outreach, and scholarship programs. Please help us out by donating to our GoFundMe campaign, and consider volunteering by filling out our volunteering application. We need volunteers for as little as an hour or two. Every hour is appreciated. Familiarity with VR and VR platforms recommended.

Consider subscribing to our Educators in VR event subscription channel to receive regular reminders of upcoming events, including International Summit events.

Join our Educators in VR Discord group, Facebook, and follow us on Twitter for information on meetups and how to become more involved.

2020 Educators in VR International Summit

February 5, 2020March 26, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / Leave a comment

International Summit: Volunteer and Donate

February 5, 2020February 5, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / Leave a comment

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit begins in less than two weeks and we’ve opened up a GoFundMe 2020 Educators in VR International Summit Campaign to help offset the costs of this free and open-to-the-public all virtual conference. We welcome your help.

The Educators in VR International Summit, February 17-22, 2020, is not just breaking new ground, it is causing an earthquake. The 6-day event features over 160 speakers from around the world presenting across over 200 hours of virtual events, with many live streamed and recorded for future airing on our Educators in VR YouTube channel. The Summit will be held across AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, rumii, Mozilla Hubs, and Somnium Space.

According to people who track these things, outside of Second Life, this is the largest virtual event ever, and the largest immersive, all-virtual conference ever. It’s amazing!

We are also trying to break the world record for the most people at a virtual event for our closing ceremonies in Somnium Space, February 22 at noon PST. We hope you will join us.

The Educators in VR International Summit is more than the 160+ speakers and panels and the diverse wealth of expertise and knowledge they are sharing freely. It is also about the dozens and dozens of volunteers giving freely of their time to help make this event a success by moderating, filming, managing the vast paperwork and schedule, and supporting us in so many ways. It takes a village, and our members come from their own international villages to help us in our virtual one.

We are asking for your help in two ways. You may choose both. We hope you will.

Volunteer: We need volunteers of all skills. Even helping to moderate for an hour or two during the 6-day event is helpful. Or an hour or two a day. Or longer. Join this historical event by filling out our Volunteer Form.

Donate: The funds raised through out GoFundMe Campaign not only help support the International Summit, but also help us fund:

Educators in VR scholarships funds for training, classes, workshops, and curriculum development.
VR and AR equipment as part of our outreach programs around the world.
Ongoing free and open-to-public workshops and training programs to future-proof educators in immersive and spatial technologies.
Research into the effects, practices, standards, and efficacy of VR/AR in education beyond the WOW-effect.
Our commitment to cut carbon emissions. We are calculating the carbon footprint of our event and comparing it to that of a similar real world event. We believe there is a great future for virtual conferences and summits and are proud to be blazing a trail!

Educators in VR is dedicated to providing educational training, resources, connections, and experiences to educators, learners, researchers, and passionate enthusiasts to help them integrate immersive technologies into education.

Last year, Educators in VR has hosted over 100 free educational weekly workshops in AltspaceVR as well as special events in ENGAGE and other virtual social and educational platforms, reaching over 4,000 attendees. Topics included immersive classroom experiences, textbook publishing with AR, cyberbullying in VR, developing VR classes with elementary students teaching teachers how to teach with and in VR, VR lab building, and reports on research in immersive and spatial technologies for education.

Educators in VR presented in-person and virtual workshops at AWE 2019, VRX2019 Conference in Amsterdam, the VR/AR Global Summit for the VR/AR Association, among many others last year. We’ve been featured in the AltspaceVR Community Spotlight newsletter, The Virtual Reality Podcast, and the upcoming WebXR Podcast.

Help us make our dreams come true for the thousands of attendees for the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit, and for our ongoing work in helping the education industry prepare for the future.

Thanks!

The Educators in VR Team

February 2020 Schedule of Events

February 2, 2020February 2, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / Leave a comment

Have we got a month of events for you this month! Oh, where to start?

Let’s begin with our regular weekly Educators in VR workshops on Tuesdays in AltspaceVR. Last month we had some amazing events with Chris Madsen of ENGAGE discussing how to set up a VR classroom and the standards and practices you should consider.

Nicolas Barone of the Universe dazzled us with tips and tricks on how he presents computer science and programming workshops in AltspaceVR.

With these and other exciting workshops and events behind us, what’s coming up?

February Workshops and Social

We will get to the information on the International Summit, but let’s look at what we have for our regular Tuesday Educators in VR workshops and events.

February 4, 2020 – Educators in VR Social: We have a fun Educators in VR Social event where you will have a chance to meet other educators from around the world and network and learn what others are up to in integrating VR into education, from the classroom to research to development. With the International Conference in a couple weeks, this is a great opportunity for speakers and volunteers to meet up, and you to meet them as well. We are expecting a full house, so get there early.

February 11, 2020 – Creating Educational Events in AltspaceVR: This popular event explores creating educational events in AltspaceVR, and in other VR educational and social platforms. It’s a great introduction for those new to hosting educational events in virtual reality, exploring the considerations of the event space or world, making it public, private, or paid, and tips and techniques for immersive classroom experiences.

February 25, 2020 – Educators in VR After Summit Social: Come party with us to celebrate the After Summit Social, an opportunity to network with attendees, speakers, and volunteers who survived the International Summit. We will be partying hardying!

2020 Educators in VR International Summit

Honestly, we started out with a goal of 40 speakers spread across 5 or 6 days in a couple of VR platforms. Little did we realize when we sent out the speaker application during the holidays, the worst time possible to coordinate an event, we would be flooooooded with applications. They were so good, we decided that since we were doing this virtual, and virtual reality is infinite – right? What’s the harm in expanding?

We will find out February 17-22, 2020, in AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, rumii, Mozilla Hubs, and Somnium Space. We have about 170 speakers and panelists lined up for almost 24 hours a day for six days. Are you ready for this? The schedule will be published shortly.

To manage all this, we have volunteer meetings in AltspaceVR and in our Discord server, and training sessions to help speakers.

Speaker 101: Training Sessions: To help speakers prepare for the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit, we’re hosting a series of training sessions exploring options on how to present in VR including the use of the moderation and hosting tools, slides, presentation styles, and how to keep your audience in their hot and heavy headsets in their virtual seats and engaged for the full length of your presentation while fiddling with all the little bits behind the scenes. These are open to the public as well, so if consider presenting educational events in VR, especially in AltspaceVR, you won’t want to miss one of these special presentations.

February 6, 2020 Thursday – Public Volunteers Meetup for Educators in VR International Summit: Considering volunteering for the Educators in VR International Summit, or volunteering to help with Educators in VR in general, or maybe an AltspaceVR event, Lorelle and the Educators in VR team will introduce you to the opportunities to support Educators in VR events and activities, and teach you a little about how this volunteering in VR thing works. Volunteering doesn’t take much time. We need volunteers willing to give an hour or two during the International Summit, or maybe longer. It’s up to you. We need people of all skills and abilities, from office style work (spreadsheets, email, taking notes, project management) to moderating events to filming and recording events in VR. Even if you don’t know how, we are here to help you learn. Stretch a little and learn something new! This is a great opportunity.

These are all open to the public. If you are a speaker or volunteer, you will be provided with private event information.

Many of the sessions will be live streamed and/or recorded and posted to our YouTube channel, but we need volunteers to help make this happen.

The master calendar will be on our website on our International Event page, and we will be announcing speakers in the next few days.

Consider subscribing to our Educators in VR event subscription channel to receive regular reminders of upcoming events there.

Educators in VR is dedicated to providing educational events, trainings, and workshops for educators and learners to prepare them for the future of spatial technologies in education. We offer weekly workshops in AltspaceVR and other platforms, and a monthly meetup featuring key educators, trainers, and developers in VR, AR, XR, and MR technology and education.

Join our Educators in VR Discord group, Facebook, and follow us on Twitter for information on meetups and how to become more involved.

To Attend Educators in VR Events in AltspaceVR

We meet in AltspaceVR, a free virtual reality social app and community. You may RSVP on our events page and AltspaceVR will send you a reminder an hour before the event.

You may attend as a guest or member using the free AltspaceVR mobile app or 2D version. AltspaceVR is available for Samsung Gear, Steam Store for HTC Vive, Windows Mixed Reality, and the Oculus Store for Rift, Go and Quest users. If you do not have a VR device, you may also install the 2D version for use on your Windows desktop computer. A headset and microphone (quality earbuds acceptable) is required to participate. Otherwise please stay muted during the event as the background noise and echoes may be disruptive. For more information on accessing and installing AltspaceVR, check out their download web page.

If you would like to present at one of our weekly workshops, please submit your speaker’s proposal to us. Considering joining one of our many team projects. If you have questions or need more information, please contact us or connect with one of our many social media channels.

January 2020 Events Schedule

January 7, 2020January 9, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / Leave a comment

Educators in VR - Daniel Dyboski-Bryant presents a workshop in AltspaceVR. Educators in VR’s weekly workshops continue on Tuesdays in AltspaceVR, educating and inspiring you with creative ways to integrate VR, AR, XR, and MR into education, even though the wheels are turning at a furious pace for our upcoming 2020 Educators in VR International Summit, February 17-22, 20202.

January 8, 2020 – Chris Madsen’s Setting Up a VR Classroom: Chris Madsen will cover some of the basic challenges and how to overcome them to develop VR in the classroom. His innovative research over the past year will help you learn how to handle the concerns of administration and faculty, and how to create a safe and secure environment for the students and teachers. Chris is a lively and fascinating expert, so bring your questions and concerns to the workshop tomorrow. RSVP so you won’t miss it.

January 14, 2020 – Nicolas Barone on Teaching Computer Science in VR: Nicolas spent the last few months developing innovative methodologies for teaching computer science and programming in a VR environment, specifically working with AltspaceVR, testing its limits and pushing boundaries. The founder of Universe, a collaborative online computer science educational company, he will share his experiences, lessons learned, and innovations with us in a week, so make sure you RSVP now to receive a reminder before the event.

January 21, 2020 – Educators in VR 101: The Educators in VR Curriculum Team has been developing this introductory program, Educators in VR 101, over the past year and it continues to develop as new technology and research into methodologies evolve. If you are new to immersive technologies in education and the classroom, this hour workshop introduces you to the basics and offers you the opportunity to get the answers you need to take the next step toward introducing yourself and your classroom or research to this new emerging technology.

January 28, 2020 – Exploring the Immersive Classroom: Teaching in VR’s unique immersion experience brings many challenges and concerns. The Educators in VR Curriculum Team’s workshop on working with immersive classrooms explores the potential of working with virtual worlds and spaces in education, from teaching within them, working with students to create immersive worlds, and encouraging virtual worlds as homework assignments. Each session takes you to two or more worlds that serve as examples.

February 4, 2020 – Educators in VR Social: We offer a social networking meetup regularly to allow us to connect through the magic of VR with other educators, learners, researchers, and enthusiasts from around the world and learn about how they use immersive technologies in education. Come join us for a drink and a virtual snack in our beautiful Educators in VR training facility in AltspaceVR.

February 17-22, 2020 – 2020 Educators in VR International Summit: While the International Summit is still evolving as the deadline for speakers just passed and we are starting to pour through the outstanding submissions and notify speakers, expect 80+ hours of educational programs, workshops, fireside chats, and panels on a wide-sweeping range of topics on immersive and spatial technologies in education. The event will be hosted in AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, and other social and educational virtual platforms. The event will be live streamed from each of the platforms for the main conference track, and other events will be recorded and shared later via our website and Youtube channel.

Consider subscribing to our Educators in VR event subscription channel to receive regular reminders of upcoming events there.

Join our Educators in VR Discord group, Facebook, and follow us on Twitter for information on meetups and how to become more involved.

Some other educational and informative events happening in AltspaceVR that you might not want to miss include:

AltspaceVR 101: AltspaceVR offers regular 30 minute workshops with tips and techniques for learning how to use AltspaceVR and be introduced to the strong and healthy metaverse community. The are held five days a week at various hours for different time zones. The next ones are Wednesday, Saturday early and later in the day, and Sunday.
Tech Tock with Jesse Damiani: Thursdays, the technology reporter from SNHU, Forbes, and The Verge features intimate conversations and open discussions with the leaders in the virtual technology fields from artists and developers to producers and entrepreneurs.
Improv Night with Stevieboy and Shoseki: Every Saturday, AltspaceVR becomes an innovative zone for crazy and good times as users become improvisational actors on the stage working with audience suggestions. Totally unpredictable, it’s a great example of the potential for the same comedy interactivity and collaboration you might bring to your classroom.
CES 2020: VR/AR/XR, Healthcare, AI, Robots, Drones, Sustainability & Climate with Health Systems Chat: Thursdays, Chuck Webster of Health Systems Chat covers a wide ranging topic related to healthcare technologies. This week is the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) and he will be covering the event. His next event is about the history, recipes, science, and farming of potatoes to honor the international Potato Expo in Las Vegas that week. And on January 30, he tackles the topic of assistive technology and virtual reality.
C# Programming Course: Mohamad offers C# programming courses in AltspaceVR. Sunday, January 19, he begins his next series on intermediate level courses.
Introduction to Unity: Nicolas Barrone and his team are joined by Matt Cook this month to teach world building and VR app and game development using Unity. The free course starts January 22.
Meditating on Morality: Tom Nickels of EvolVR, an expert on mortality and meditation, holds regular sessions in AltspaceVR tackling these serious issues with great insights and experience.
The EvolVR Book Club: Meeting month, the EvolVR Book Club explores spiritual books and teachings. Last month’s book was The Tibetan Book of the Dead, and this month’s book is Ram Dass’ Be Here Now.
Humanism: The Self-Domestication of Humans: An innovative educational exploration on how humans share many of the characteristics of domesticated animals and the evolution of this process, one of many fascinating topics shared by Ron Flannery at the monthly Humanism Meetups.
Poetry Slam: A biweekly event on Mondays with users stepping up to the stage to share their poetry, rap, and short stories, another example of the potential for a classroom experience.
Creative Writing Meetup: Lorelle hosts an innovative workshop Tuesdays for creative writers writing short stories, essays, memoirs, poetry, or those just wishing to expand their creative writing abilities. This is the second year of the meetups and this year more special event workshops, classes, and programs will be featured.

To Attend Educators in VR Events in AltspaceVR

We meet in AltspaceVR, a free virtual reality social app and community. You may RSVP on our events page and AltspaceVR will send you a reminder an hour before the event.

Workshop: Chris Madsen and Setting Up a VR Classroom

January 6, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / 1 Comment

Chris Madsen - ENGAGE. Our next Educators in VR Weekly Workshop tomorrow, January 7, 2020, is one you will not want to miss. Chris Madsen of ENGAGE explores using VR in the classroom, diving deeply into the challenges we all face: security, safety, surroundings, software, and hardware. As we only have an hour, he will spend more time on the first parts, which are essential aspects of the decision-making process. His focus will be on high school and below ages, but apply to all levels of classroom integration for students and educators new to VR.

Chris Madsen holds many titles and credits but we have to admit that he is one of the most passionate evangelists for virtual reality in the world. Considered one of the top influencers in VR and education, his work with ENGAGE, the powerful, award-winning educational platform, created by VR Education Holdings PLC, is helping to change the face of online education. Immersive VR Education company works with a wide range of clients including the University of the West of England (UWE Bristol), University of Oxford, BBC, HTC, Shenandoah University, and the US Air Force Academy. His Twitter account is filled with a wide range of inspirational and newsworthy posts worth following.

Co-founder of the Utah Virtual Reality Meetup, an Ambassador in the Edge of Discovery non-profit that develops emergency media projects with VR and AR for historically silenced, simplified, and minimized societies, CEO of Digital Realities, and business development and evangelist for ENGAGE, he brings a passion to our workshops that will help you step off the fence when it comes to including immersive technology into the classroom.

Chris has been working extensively in researching and developing, and simplifying, the process of integrating VR into the classroom over the past year, as opposed to bringing the classroom to virtual reality. He spent twenty years working in Behavioral Science, and brings that expertise to this process.

Many school administrators are very worried about the risks of integrating VR into the classroom, and how to not only do it safely but with purposeful intention for the students and the teachers. He will cover the psychological and physically challenges associated with VR in the classroom, and help us understand how to create a safe and positive experience, dealing with the sharing of equipment, nausea concerns, safety issues, and help us make these challenges positive.

He will also cover some of the basics to consider when it comes to the logistics, and we are eager to have him dive even deeper into this subject and more at the 2020 Educators in VR International Conference, February 17-22. Yes, consider him one of the first announced speakers for our ground-breaking event. 😀

The sudden death of Chris Long, another ground-breaking innovator of education and VR, was a great loss. As a long-time friend, Madsen facilitated a beautiful celebration of the life of Chris Long in Engage, allowing so many to make piece with their grief and pay their respects.

Here are some podcasts, interviews, and articles about Chris Madsen to help you learn a little more about the passion he brings to this industry.

Join our Educators in VR Discord group, Facebook, and follow us on Twitter for information on meetups and how to become more involved. Consider subscribing to our Educators in VR event subscription channel to receive regular reminders of upcoming events there. We publish member brags and news you can use about virtual reality in education across the entire spectrum of usage from childhood education to health and science to corporate.

To Attend Educators in VR Events in AltspaceVR

We meet in AltspaceVR, a free virtual reality social app and community. You may RSVP on our events page and AltspaceVR will send you a reminder an hour before the event.

Educators in VR: Good-bye 2019, Hello 2020

January 5, 2020February 5, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / 1 Comment

Now that we are starting off a new year and a new decade, we want to take a moment to look back on all that we’ve accomplished in our first year and be amazed. When Daniel told me he wanted our tagline to be “The sky is no longer the limit,” I thought it was cute. I didn’t realize it would become our motto.

Seriously, in spite of many personal disruptions, Daniel Dyboski-Bryant and myself have worked long hours in addition to full-time jobs to develop Educators in VR on a shoestring budget. Its success as a membership community and social profit company based in the UK is amazing because of you.

Educators in VR Meetup 2018 in Altspace - emojis to celebrate the first event. What started out as a conversation between four educators to host a social meetup to explore educators using VR for research and integration into the classroom exploded into weekly educational and training workshops and presentations in AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, and other social and educational platforms, and, coming in February, a ground-breaking six-day virtual conference called “2020 Educators in VR International Summit.”

In the past 13 months, Educators in VR has accomplished the following:

Hosted 48 workshops and meetups in AltspaceVR.
Hosted multiple events in ENGAGE, rumii, and Mozilla Hubs (with more on the way).
Averaged 40 attendees at each event (the cap in AltspaceVR for the past 6 months was 40 so that means standing room only. Before then, we averaged 80.).
Reached an audience estimated to be about 4,000 just in AltspaceVR across over 80 workshop hours.
Hosted 550 members on our Discord server, and our Facebook group is about the same with some overlap between the two. Discord is our most active social platform with over 7,700 comments in less than a year, and we’ve over 1,000 followers on Twitter.
Attracted 3,000 pageviews on our website in a few months time with little or no marketing.
Developed seven different educational workshops, along with a dozen variations for specific audiences.
Presented live virtual and in-person workshops at AWE, VRX2019 Conference in Amsterdam, and the VR/AR Global Summit for the VR/AR Association.
Co-hosted over 6 hours of the 24-hour International VR Day in November.
Presented 5 special events, speakers, and panels on cyberbullying in virtual reality as part of honoring Cyberbullying Month in AltspaceVR.
Featured in “Getting Social with VR Education” with VR Focus, AltspaceVR Community Spotlight: Educators in VR, Educators in VR Meetup by The Virtual Reality Podcast, and other media.
Lorelle built a custom event world for Educators in VR, and Mark S. of the UK took the prototype and turned into into a marvelous event and social space for our weekly workshops and social gatherings.
Continue to develop scholarship and donation programs to help fund educational programs for integration of VR into the classroom and provide equipment for students and educators in need.

The Educators in VR Project Teams

Educators in VR vLanguage Learning Of all the things we are proud of accomplishing this year, we are the most proud of our Project Team leaders and members. These are truly passionate and inspired people who’ve taken on leading these special project teams to host events, workshops, and dive even deeper into the research and curriculum for their specialties. I’d like you to meet them.

Continue reading →

2020 International Summit Call for Speakers Extended

January 2, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / Leave a comment

Due to overwhelming demand, we’ve extended the call for speakers for the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit, February 17-22, 2020, to January 5.

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit is a free, open-to-the public, virtual event lasting 6 days (over 80 round-the-clock hours) with a diverse range of speakers and presentations covering:

The Basics of VR/AR/XR/MR
Research into Spatial Technologies in Education
Corporate Uses for Training and Education
Language Arts Training, Education, and as a Classroom
Coaching and Personal Development
Medical and Science
Computer Science and Math
Student Maker/Creator Projects, Collaborations, and Apps
Virtual Applications and Hardware for the Classroom

The diversity of topics by educational professionals, developers, researchers, and even students is impressive, covering even more topics than those listed above. We’re eager to offer a wide smorgasbord of virtual presentations, and you are still welcome to submit your speaker’s application.

If you are an educator, expert, evangelist, trainer, app developer or founder, researcher, or passionate learner eager to share your educational virtual reality, augmented reality, extended or mixed reality passions, we invite you to submit a Speaker Proposal for the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit. The deadline is January 5. Speakers will be announced by January 10, 2020.

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit will be hosted on AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, and other virtual social and educational platforms.

Come join the fun February 17-22, 2020.

Announcing the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit

December 10, 2019January 2, 2020 / Lorelle VanFossen / 5 Comments

During our first year, Educators in VR has accomplished great things, bringing together a global community of educators, learners, and researchers integrating virtual and spatial technologies into education, and now we’re proud to announce another ground-breaking, pioneering event: 2020 Educators in VR International Summit February 17-22, 2020.

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit is a free, open-to-the public, virtual event lasting 6 days (over 80 round-the-clock hours) with a diverse range of speakers and presentations covering:

The Basics of VR/AR/XR/MR
Research into Spatial Technologies in Education
Corporate Uses for Training and Education
Language Arts Training, Education, and as a Classroom
Coaching and Personal Development
Medical and Science
Computer Science and Math
Student Maker/Creator Projects, Collaborations, and Apps
Virtual Applications and Hardware for the Classroom

And so much more. We have topics under consideration covering the use of social media with virtual reality, education in religion and virtual worlds, world building, VR/AR app development, social and educational VR platforms, and open discussions with some of the world’s foremost experts in education and integrating extended reality.

The 2020 Educators in VR International Summit will be hosted on AltspaceVR, ENGAGE, and other virtual social and educational platforms.

This will be a one-of-a-kind event bringing together a global community focused on improving our educational technology and standards, and walking the walk in an all-virtual, immersive conference. Presentations will be scheduled around the clock to ensure access no matter what your time zone.

If you are an educator, expert, evangelist, trainer, app developer or founder, researcher, or passionate learner eager to share your educational virtual reality, augmented reality, extended or mixed reality passions, we invite you to submit a Speaker Proposal for the 2020 Educators in VR International Summit. The deadline is December 30. Speakers will be announced by January 5, 2020.

Volunteers are needed to help with moderation, hosting, or recording and streaming the events throughout the week. If you would like to volunteer, please sign up with our 2020 Educators in VR International Summit Volunteer Form.

We will be announcing partners and sponsors soon, along with partner and sponsor applications. It will take much collaboration and money to support and make this free week-long event possible, and your help will be needed.

We are breaking ground here with this virtual conference covering more than 80 hours of educational presentations in a mix of traditional conference with online and distance learning familiarity, combined with a generous pinch of unconference, in virtual spaces open to all with a passion for virtual education.

We’ve seen VR change lives. Now is our opportunity to share our passion with others and learn from each other. You will not want to miss this.

Come join the fun February 17-22, 2020.