The COVID-19 epidemic, which limited our social activity by locking us in our homes, has led to unprecedented activity in the digital sphere, not only forcing entire areas of culture and education to embrace the virtual, but also to look for new ways to engage and strengthen participation in this realm. With the traditional channels of consumption and participation in events closed, education, tourism, the conference industry as well as artistic practice had to find new ways to reach their audiences. These actors focused not only on the flat screens of media consumption, but increasingly tried to build a new space for the audience to be immersed in and transported by. An alternative world, in which we can access cultural goods beyond the limits of social distancing, developed at a rapid pace by offering virtual cinemas (https://arvrtech.eu/blog/vr-cinema-movies), art galleries (https://acuteart.com/artist), virtual museums (https://www.museumnext.com/article/how-museums-are-using-virtual-reality/), or film festivals (https://www.labiennale.org/en/cinema/2020/venice-vr-expanded). Suddenly we could visit, watch, but also participate in debates and conferences in which speakers performed using their virtual avatars. This year’s Open Eyes Economy conference not only took up VR as a very important topic of discussion on the future of the world, but also organized discussion panels in this medium (https://oees.pl/realne-granice-wirtualnej-rzeczywistosci/). Tourism, affected by numerous restrictions, also explores new opportunities and encourages to learn about the new offer in virtual reality: https://www.forbes.com/sites/solrogers/2020/03/18/virtual-reality-and-tourism-whats-already-happening-is-it-the-future. The development of new technologies has accelerated to the extent that it is difficult to keep up not only with what is new, but above all with the possibilities of their use. There is a shortage of specialists who would help cultural institutions to operate, educate and meet the needs of their audiences in the new, virtual dimension, but, more importantly, there are no (human) resources for training staff. This project responds to the urgent need to enrich the existing educational programs for both cultural and media managers, but also for artists aspiring to connect with their audiences in the digital space. The project’s overall goal is to develop an educational offer for these groups in the field of immersive media (XR), and ways of using these media to engage audiences. More specifically, the project aims at increasing the skills and competences of the participants in designing and evaluating immersive experiences in order to effectively manage, disseminate, and produce culture in the digital sphere. Further, it is about increasing the knowledge and competences of the academic staff working with immersion technologies, in order to effectively manage, disseminate, and produce digital culture in a market environment. The political, economic, social, technological, environmental and legal aspect of the immersive trend will be scrutinized through specialized training courses. The project’s team will also elaborate open educational resources (OER) in the field of experience management and culture with the use of immersive technologies. Last but not least, the projects aim is to help building an open attitude of students and academic staff towards the application of new technologies in the humanities. The participating organizations are the Jagiellonian University, the Film School in Lodz (with their center of excellence in the digital media, the Visual Narratives Laboratory), The University of Malta (the Department of Digital Arts as knowledge transfer partner Learning Teaching Training and summer school organizer), and the University of Athens (Laboratory of new technologies in communication, education and mass media as knowledge transfer partner (in VR design and evaluation), LTT and Multiplier event organizer. The educational activities in the project are planned as follows: a summer school in Malta, involving 5 students from each participating HEI to work in the University’s immersive lab with a VR cave that can hold 5 to 10 people, a winter school in Kraków, involving again 5 students from each HEI, and 4 Learning Teaching Training sessions: two during the summer/winter schools, and another two separate 5-day events in Malta and Athens respectively. Each will include 5 academic teachers from the JU and Film School, MU and NKAU. As to the project’s implementation methodology, we will follow a project management approach that combines agile methods with traditional PMI, involving such activities, as: regular monthly short online meetings of working groups for IO (stand up) and ad-hoc meetings and activities, as well as quarterly online meetings of the national coordinators (Management Committee), with the key decision-making process based on the partners’ consensus.
The main goals of the project were: 1.To develop educational offerings for cultural and media managers and artists on new immersive technologies such as XR, VR, AR, MR and how to use to engage audiences, and 2.Increase skills and competencies in designing and evaluating experiences using immersive technologies to effectively manage culture in the digital realm. To achieve these goals, we decided to focus on increasing the knowledge and competence of academic staff on immersive experience design and evaluation through the implementation of training courses, the development of open educational resources (OER) on the topic of immersive experience management in culture (IO3 and IO4), but also building an open attitude among students and staff to new methods and technologies - offering participation in a summer and winter school. We believed that we would be able to achieve this, but we did not anticipate that under such difficult conditions the project would become popular and recognized throughout Europe. Due to the specific moment, we managed to join the mainstream of change and become a positive example illustrating the HE sector's activities in XR and Virtual Worlds development.
The ErasmusXr project "Experience and immersive technologies - from creative practice to educational Theory" was prepared for the special call KA226 - Partnerships for Digital Education Readiness during the COVID-19 pandemic. When preparing the project in the summer of 2020, we did not yet know how the pandemic would develop and how long it would last. Nevertheless, we were experiencing more and more the development of digital technologies (including immersive technologies), which is now called WEB 4.0 and virtual worlds (https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/ip_23_3718 ). The COVID-19 epidemic reduced our social activity by locking us in our homes and led to an unprecedented activity in the digital world, forcing not only entire areas of culture and education to move their activities into the virtual realm, but also to seek new ways to engage and enhance participation in this form. This was the main external factor motivating us to undertake the project. In addition to external factors, there was growing student frustration and dissatisfaction at the UJ with the lack of delivery of up-to-date content to illustrate classes in the field of cultural and media management. Research conducted by Dr. Konior and Dr. Pluszynska left no illusions - lecturers lacked familiarity with the latest artistic and technological developments using immersive media. The classes were accused of resorting to lukewarm examples and lacking appeal. Therefore, a project was prepared that addressed the urgent need to enrich existing educational programs for both cultural and media managers, but also for artists aspiring to connect with audiences in the digital space.