Traversing the Parthenon, Saint Petersburg and Badami, India, all in less than a day is an impossible task – but with the Virtual Reality Lab at William & Mary, students could make that trek in a single class period. 

Mike Blum, assistant director of faculty engagement at the Studio for Teach and Learning Innovation (STLI), is helping faculty at the university embrace the technology for use in their courses. The work is part of the university’s efforts to increase data fluency across disciplines and to provide the most personal education of any public university in the nation. 

Blum held a Lunch & Learn on Feb. 26 for faculty interested in seeing the expansive world VR has to offer. Attendees visited STLI’s Virtual Reality Lab in Boswell Hall, a classroom housing 28 headsets that students, staff and faculty alike can use.

Blum stumbled into the world of virtual reality almost by accident. With Teaching Professor of Russian Studies Bella Ginzbursky-Blum planning to lead a summer program in Lithuania and Blum creating digital storytelling projects, the trip was canceled after the war in Ukraine began. Still hoping to create an engaging opportunity for students now left on campus, Blum and Ginzbursky-Blum decided to use leftover STLI funds to purchase 10 headsets. 

“For me, technology always kind of has an integral meaning,” Blum said. “It has its own beauty.”

Thanks to a Humanities Innovation Grant, Blum has been able to expand his supply of headsets and create a permanent home for them in Boswell Hall.

“Before that, I had my cart and would bring it around to whatever building and try to get it running,” he said.

A physical connection to a virtual world

Some of the most recent classes adding VR this semester include classical studies, religious studies, Russian studies and environmental science. Jessica Paga, associate professor of classical studies, said she uses VR to take static images of landmarks like the Parthenon and apps like Wander and Google Street View to immerse students in the Acropolis with a complete 360-degree view.

“Studies have shown that (activating the body) creates a deeper resonance and a bigger mark on memory,” she said. “It’s a way to make the ancient world so much more accessible, so much more understandable.”

Mark McLaughlin, a teaching professor of South Asian religions, has been on the VR bandwagon for a while. Years ago, he consulted with Blum about Google Cardboard, an early version of immersion that allowed participants to use their smartphones as the equivalent of an old-time stereoscope.

For his Intro to Hinduism course, he filmed his own footage with a 360 camera in India and uploaded it to his class folder for students to understand metaphysical parameters in relation to the presence of deities in religious ceremonies.

“When you enter these spaces via the headset, you are literally spatially oriented, and it becomes experiential,” McLaughlin said. “You feel your senses react as if you are literally standing there.”

An eagerness to engage

Students overwhelmingly approve of using virtual reality. Last semester alone, the lab had over 300 students who explored virtual spaces, not including the War in Ukraine series events the lab has done in partnership with W&M Libraries. Surveys found an overall satisfaction level of 4.75/5 in addition to a 4.7/5 rating for engagement.

For faculty interested in integrating virtual reality into their courses, Blum stresses the importance of having a clear goal for students to achieve while wearing the headsets. For most assignments, this means making comparisons to different environments, finding and analyzing specific artifacts and having students describe their surroundings in detail. Collaboration is also a vital piece of the equation.

“When they’re able to partner with somebody, either when somebody has a sheet they’re reading off of while the other person is in the headset, or they’re joining up in virtual space, they tend to have a much better experience,” Blum said.

Blum added that the learning curve isn’t as intimidating as it might seem. Faculty members are paired with an app like Wander that has curated experiences for students. Those experiences include various street view-level sights that are paired with worksheets Blum has helped to build. Depending on whether faculty want to pair it with a specific lesson plan, Blum is able to consult faculty and formulate a template.

“That’s one of the great things about my position as a consultant is that I know what people are interested in,” he said. “I know the questions they are asking.”

The lab had record-breaking attendance on March 5, with four class sessions totaling 110 students using the headsets.

“The ability to virtually be in a space is transformational in some way for students,” Blum said. “They’re not getting that sitting in a classroom.”

The virtual lab has an exciting future. In addition to creating a university teaching and learning project to design more assignments for STLI, Blum is in the early stages of getting students to create their own content. With this, students can start coding and crafting their own virtual environments, allowing for a more hands-on digital experience for the humanities.

Blum has already presented on virtual reality for various conferences and has more planned in the future, and he’s considering an article for an academic journal.

For now, Blum is focused on expanding the reach of VR one class at a time.

“(We’re) a victim of our success in a way,” he said. “The more excited I got about VR, the more I wanted to advocate for it.”

Examples of current and past virtual reality labs can be found at vrlab.gs.wm.edu.