Virtual Field Trip

The Virtual Field Trip is a prototype learning experience designed to flip the idea of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). Whereas MOOCs bring students from outside the university into the academy through a virtual learning experience, we propose to create a platform that enables students within the university to venture off-campus and into the most exciting, demanding and provocative worlds of professionals in their field. The platform can in turn be used for online learning, but our primary objective has been to address one method for enhancing the learning of our on-campus students.

• The project developed a sophisticated platform for integrating professionals in real time into the classroom through the use of Google Glass, the wearable computer currently in development by the Project Glass research group at Google. Google Glass features an optical head-mounted display, as well as a camera and wireless connectivity, making it uniquely suited to first-person observations that can be simultaneously transmitted to an audience. Imagine following film director and producer J.J. Abrams as he tours the set of Star Wars Episode VII, takes a meeting and makes a series of significant decisions! Or imagine any other high-profile professional in any number of diverse settings as he or she shares real world experiences with university students. Direct access to real people in real situations, deftly framed in a participatory learning environment, has tremendous potential for enhancing the learning of our students.
• The prototype uses available technology to create a series of two-way conversations between students on campus and professionals in the field using Google Glass and a customized interface designed to facilitate clarity and intimacy between the students and the professional. Current development is using a high rez 360camera to stream stereo imagery to a VR headset. The camera will be mounted on both human and robot platforms.

Project Date:  2015

Project Team: 

• Jivitesh Dhaliwal
• Scott Fisher
• Perry Hoberman