Page 12 - Campus Technology, May/June 2019

Learning Spaces
University of Louisiana Monroe Library’s lab and study space
they can use. So this is how the library sup- ports that, by kicking into the kitty.”
Adding Pizzazz
The biggest sparkle in the jewel could well come from the virtual reality lab, a space out- fitted with 28 Oculus Go headsets and 28 high-end computers packed with the compo- nents for the intensive graphic rendering that VR requires. The room also has three HTC Vives with wireless adaptors as well as three sets of VR gloves, which allow the wearers to have tactile experiences too. An instructor machine will be hooked up to two large moni- tors at the front of the classroom to let stu- dents see what the professor wants to show them. And an additional large screen will be set up outside the room, so that people who are in the library for other reasons can see what’s going on in the VR classroom.
Recently, the library hosted an orientation, working with 20 faculty members who will be part of the initial group of instructors using the space. During that event, participants experi- enced what it was like to travel through the human body and were taken on a 3D tour of the new medical school being constructed on cam- pus (captured with a 360-degree camera).
The IT and library crew hopes to treat the room like a chemistry lab, said Hoover. Students will come in for regular classes, and there will be drop-in hours. Currently, the team is sifting through the proposals from that initial group of faculty who tested the equipment. They plan to select “five, six or eight” ideas and work with those instructors on integrating VR usage into their classes for the rest of the semester or as part of “onesie-twosie” uses. On the roster are courses covering geography, computer science, biology, education and speech pathology.
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CAMPUS TECHNOLOGY | May/June 2019