Hundreds
of Universities and Schools are experimenting with virtual worlds, on-line
games and simulations for research, collaboration and learning. Today, Sun and St.
Paul College held a ribbon cutting ceremony for the new
Sun Center of Excellence for Open Virtual Worlds. Today's event advances the
initial technology demonstration in support of the global build-out of The
Education Grid open network of 3-D servers for teaching and learning with the
Immersive Education Initiative at Media Grid.
St.
Paul College President Donovan Schichtenberg, Sun VP of Education
Joe Hartley and Director of the Grid Institute Aaron Walsh joined to
officially open the Virtual Northstar campus, which will begin hosting live
virtual classes in Fall 2009. Sun CEO Jonathan Schwartz was even on hand via video to
address the group and welcome in the new Center of Excellence.
Check out the demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-pRHNUvuVgg that shows a tour of St. Paul College’s Virtual Northstar environment using
Sun’s Project Wonderland Platform
Sun
is a leading contributor to the research, development and
deployment of open source solutions for “immersive education” with
Project Wonderland, Project Darkstar
and SunSPOT technologies.
Sun’s involvement in the collaboration extends the notion of open
source collaboration to a global audience with the Sun Immersion Special Interest Group,
comprised of more than 700 people representing 120 institutions, schools,
developers and other education community in more than 40 around the world.
Sun
offers today a full solution to pilot and develop virtual world platforms
called the Sun Immersion System and participates in the "Own-a-Node"
program with Media Grid.
Also
in partnership with Sun, the startup Virtual Learning Labs was founded in St.
Paul to be dedicated to the emerging field of real-time virtual education
platforms - allowing organizations to immediately participate in the emerging
world of teaching, learning and collaborating on the 3-D Web. Virtual Learning
Labs’ employees include many students giving them leading-edge, hands on
experience with this growing technology.
The Event Video is here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65s2dXWdM4
Thanks for the mention of the project work at Saint Paul!
Posted by Kevin Roebuck on January 22, 2009 at 09:19 PM PST #