14th Annual VWBPE Conference Starts 18th – 20th March 2021

VWBPE 2021

The 14th annual virtual worlds best practices in education (VWBPE 2021) conference officially opens on 18th March through until 20th March 2021. The theme is Reconnaissance for next year’s conference. VWBPE 2021 will be held in Second Life and the conference will be focused on the “use of immersive virtual environments for educational purposes including virtual and augmented reality”.

VWBPE will again be using Linden Lab’s Second Life environment as our primary conference venue for meetings, exhibits, roundtables, and discussions. Participants are free to submit proposals and immersive experience tours on any environment for education using technologies for virtual or augmented reality. We actively encourage showcasing multiple technology platforms. This includes practical application, researched papers, conceptual, and content creation supporting those technologies.

Important Dates

• Call For Proposals/Sponsors – Open early November 2020
• Call for Exhibits – Open early November 2020
• Call for Immersive Experiences – Open early November 2020
• Registration – Open 9th November 2020
• Exhibitors Region Access – Open on 12th February 2021
• Conference Schedule – Published on 24th February 2021
• VWBPE 2021 Conference – 18th to 20th March 2021

Stay updated about VWBPE 2021 here.

Full Video: VWBPE 2020 Above the Book: What’s up at the Lab?

For anyone that missed that yesterday’s VWBPE 2020 Above the Book: What’s up at the Lab session here is the full video. Mal Burns interviews Ebbe Linden and Patch Linden. The session runs for one hour and 15 minutes.

Everyone should give it a watch and spread the word about this special session at VWBPE 2020. 

Summary

• Linden Lab have now introduced a limited time offer for education and non-profit organisations to get full regions. Reducing full region tier to US $99.00 per month
• Linden Lab focus is transitioning the Second Life infrastructure to the cloud
• Second Life is seeing a rise in concurrency and engagement
• Last Changes is just a few weeks away from launching 
• IOS Mobile Companion is very close to Alpha status. Work has started for the Android version
• Ebbe Altberg is 100% devoted to Second Life and Tilia 

VWBPE 2020 runs until 28th March 2020.

VWBPE 2020 Conference Starts Next Week

The 13th annual Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education (VWBPE) conference officially starts next Thursday 26th through until Saturday 28th March 2020 in Second Life. The theme for VWBPE 2020 is Stellar and the regions will reflect this year’s theme.

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The keynote speakers for this year’s conference. The keynote speeches will be presented at the newly re-built VWBPE Auditorium.

Dr. L. Robert Furman

Title TBA

Thursday, March 26

Opening the conference is Dr. Rob Furman. Dr. Rob is a well known educator, administrator, author and speaker from Pennsylvania. His engagement and enthusiasm for everyday education inspire audiences everywhere. We are excited to welcome Dr. Rob to Second Life and VWBPE.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drrobfurman/
Website: http://www.robfurman.com
Presentations: http://www.robfurman.com/YouTube
Podcast: http://www.robfurman.com/iTunes

 

Dr. Michael Thomas

Virtual Worlds and Social Justice: An Impact and Civic Engagement Agenda

Friday, March 27

Dr. Thomas has worked extensively with VWBPE partner vLanguages, working as PI of the CAMELOT project (EU KA3 ICT) about project-based learning with video (2013-2015); a partner in the (EU KA2) VITAL project on learning analytics (2015-2017); and PI on the GUINEVERE project (EU KA2) which examined gamification in virtual environments (2017-2019). He is a prolific author and researcher.

Dr. Thomas helps us launch Day 2 speaking on Virtual Worlds and Social Justice: An Impact and Civic Engagement Agenda.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/drmichaelthomas/

Daniel Dyboski-Bryant and Lorelle VanFossen

Lessons Learned from the 2020 Educators in VR Conference

Saturday, March 28

The final Keynote address of the conference brings us the co-founders of Educators in VR: Daniel Dyboski-Bryant and Lorelle VanFossen. This dynamic duo will be reflecting on the lessons learned at their recent and highly successful Educators in VR International Summit — 24 hours a day for 6 days in VR environments.

Daniel Dyboski-Bryant

Daniel is a lifelong educator from a family of educators and speaks 5 languages. He is a trainer, speaker and consultant of VR in Education with clients including schools, colleges, universities, design teams, training companies, councils and private individuals.

In his daytime job Daniel is the Project Lead for Exploring VR in Further Education, Remote Learning and Language, ESOL (English for Speakers of Other Languages) Lecturer, and Trainer at Coleg Llandrillo, Grwp Llandrillo-Menaia in North Wales UK.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-dyboski-bryant-1776045/

Educators in VR: https://educatorsinvr.com/

 

Lorelle VanFossen

Lorelle VanFossen is a keynote, trainer, writer, and consultant on web writing, digital storytelling, content curation, social media, and blogging, especially working with WordPress and virtual reality. Called a digital evangelist, on Lorelle on WordPress she writes and teaches more than you may want to know about how all this social publishing business stuff works.

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lorelle/

Educators in VR: https://educatorsinvr.com/

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VWBPE 2020 Map

About VWBPE

The VWBPE Conference is a completely virtual conference that is conducted using simulated environments. Participants experience the conference through a virtual reality type setting including conference rooms, theatres, exposition halls, meeting spaces, and other types of venues similar to a brick and mortar type conference.

The conference is free to attend. The cost of the conference is covered by sponsorship and donations.

Useful VWBPE 2020 Links

• VWBPE Program
• VWBPE Keynote Speakers
• Volunteer Signup