BCBusiness

March/April 2022 – The Business of Good

With a mission to inform, empower, celebrate and advocate for British Columbia's current and aspiring business leaders, BCBusiness go behind the headlines and bring readers face to face with the key issues and people driving business in B.C.

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MARCH/APRIL 2022 BCBUSINESS 47 ISTOCK can replicate, so she also practised in an ani- mated virtual environment called TomoVR. Students would pull up a patient's medical details, adjust the controls of the simulated CT machine, and run a head scan, for exam- ple. "You could actually see all the different bones that are in your skull, and the sinuses, and what it was looked like as if it were an actual CT," Swinney remembers. "It really helped to get your head wrapped around how CT machines actually work." A VIRTUAL SHOP Vancouver Community College started using virtual reality technology last year to help students practise automotive service skills. Brett Griffiths, VCC's dean of trades, technology and design, is eager to dem- onstrate VR welding to me with an Oculus headset and controllers. The visuals look like a budget video game when displayed on his office flat screen, but wearing the headset makes the experience deeply immersive. It feels like being in a workshop, welding—minus the fumes and burn hazards. Users manipulate the con- troller like an arc welder's tool, adjusting its angle, speed and direction. VCC is investing in 3D scanners to build a library of digitized objects like car engines or brakes, for learners to work with in VR. "We can integrate that stuff into different applications to enable students to virtually put something together, take it apart and learn about it," Griffiths says. Ultimately, learners need to work with real metal, but VR gear helps them get started in a flexible, safe way. "Students can just take it home in the evenings to practise their welding or painting before they come into the shop," Griffiths enthuses, "and it helps to reduce consumable costs." Educators can play with an ever-growing assortment of new tech, but Tannis Mor- gan, VCC's associate vice-president, aca- demic innovation, says they should focus on choosing the right tool for each job. "Not a day goes by without a vendor trying to get in the door," she cautions. "You have to be really careful about what is actually relevant—what is actually going to have impact for our programs and students." One of the best ways to help learners of all stripes: save them money. BCcampus is a nonprofit that supports teaching and learn- ing at the province's public universities and colleges. To that end, its open-source textbook project uses technology to make education more affordable. The organization pays educators to cre- ate digital textbooks in their fields of exper- tise. They cover the most highly enrolled college and university subjects, like intro- ductory chemistry, biology and economics. These resources are available to anyone for free, and instructors can print, reuse and modify them to suit their needs. "All of the 25 public post-secondaries have faculty who are using our textbooks, some of them much more than others," says BCcam- pus executive director Mary Burgess. "Stu- dents have saved around $27 million in the last 10 years, not having to buy textbooks." FLEX EDUCATION Affordability is just one piece of the acces- sibility puzzle that educators are trying to solve with technology. Geography can create roadblocks for many students, espe- cially in remote parts of B.C. UVic educational technology assistant professor Valerie Irvine researches and teaches multi-access learning—educating students effectively whether they attend in person or digitally. Good instructors cre- ate environments for classmates to discuss and collaborate, and those benefits should extend to online participants as well. "The design matters, to make sure that the learn- ers who are remote actually feel included," Irvine explains. Ironically, her department only offers its MA and PhD programs in an on-campus, face-to-face setting. "That's what drives me nuts," Irvine says with a laugh. "I had one person that was coming down from Kam- loops…a nine-hour drive. I gave her a tele- presence robot." The student finished the remaining weeks of the class remotely using the VGo, Smart Money The global education technology market will see a 19.9% compound annual growth rate through 2028, according to one forecast For U.S. edtech startups, venture capital and private equity fundraising climbed 29.4% in 2020 2019 $1.7 BILLION 105 deals 2020 $2.2 BILLION 130 deals SOURCES: GRAND VIEW RESEARCH, EDSURGE. ALL DOLLAR FIGURES IN USD 2022 EDUCATION GUIDE 2020 2021 2028 $379.8 BILLION $106 BILLION $86 BILLION

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