Somerset Community College, Tennessee Tech University, and Edmonds College collaborate on new virtual reality training program

A team of professors and educators have revealed a revolutionary new training platform that is expected to change the way advanced manufacturing technicians are trained. The project is a collaboration between Cookeville, Tennessee’s Tennessee Tech University, Lynnwood, Washington’s Edmonds College, and Somerset, Kentucky’s Somerset Community College.

Until now technicians and their employers have had to rely on expensive hardware and in-person training in order to learn and develop the necessary skills to do their jobs well. However, since the development of virtual reality, new possibilities for training have been opened up. There is now VR technology that will allow real-world scenarios with effective and immersive learning to be implemented and replicated through virtual reality.

The problem with virtual reality up until this point has been that VR applications are quite costly, making it difficult for technical and community colleges to be able to use them as a large-scale training tool. This is the problem the Low-Cost Virtual Reality Platform project was created to solve.

The Low-Cost Virtual Reality Platform project is led by a team of educators who have experience and expertise with VR and advanced manufacturing. The project has created, as the name would suggest, a low-cost platform for making VR modules with the possibility to be adapted and customized by colleges that would otherwise find this training method too costly. The project is funded by the National Science Foundation’s Advanced Technological Education program.

So far the platform has been used to create four different VR modules for geometric dimensioning and tolerancing, quality control, basic work area safety, and blueprint reading, with impressive results. 

The Low-Cost Virtual Reality Platform project has been working to instill the idea that effective training does not have to be out of reach or expensive. The project, by way of providing a solution to this long standing issue, is helping to create a new training method that will be accessible for companies, colleges, schools, and students.

Eric Wooldridge, a professor of Advanced Manufacturing at Somerset Community College, and Principal Investigator for the Low-Cost Virtual Reality Platform project, was quoted by The Commonwealth Journal as saying, “The potential impact of this project cannot be understated. Obviously, we are just getting the VR ball rolling at this point but consider what is possible as groups of teachers from the east coast to the west coast are capable of creating their own VR environments, lecture materials, and teaching aids.” 

The Low-Cost Virtual Reality Platform is expected to be quite the game changer as the demand for skilled advanced manufacturing technicians has been on the rise, and is only expected to grow in the near future. The project will help bridge the skills gap and prepare the next generation of advanced manufacturing technicians with the education and expertise they need to succeed in the workplace.

The team behind the project is confident that the platform will have a long term impact on advanced manufacturing technician training. By making an interactive and immersive learning environment, the platform will help engage and motivate students, while also improving comprehension and retention of the complex concepts that are part of the job. 

The project is being monitored closely by industry leaders and educators as the expectations around it are that it will become a model for future similar training programs. It looks certain that virtual reality will be a heavily utilized tool in education in the future, and the Low-Cost Virtual Reality Platform is set to serve as a good example of VR’s potential to forever change how technicians are trained. 

Dr. Ismail Fidan, who serves as a Professor of Manufacturing and Engineering Technology and College of Engineering-Faculty Fellow in Innovation and Techno-Entrepreneurship at Tennessee Technological University, was also quoted on the project as saying, “Developing VR-based educational materials has become a new way of teaching and learning in all STEM disciplines. I am so glad to be a part of this wonderful team who is developing and implementing a number of advanced technological education modules to help and support the needs of the 21st-century workforce.” 

The team behind the project expects to keep developing and refining the platform as it impacts the career success of advanced manufacturing technicians to continually improve its performance. They are determined to make their insights and findings available to the community at large with the goal of helping more people adopt and modify their platforms for their unique training programs.

So far, this research project has demonstrated the positive power of technology and innovation to change how training and education are seen and conducted, and those behind it are hopeful that their work will inspire others to find new and effective ways of training and educating the next generation of workers.

More information about Somerset Community College can be found at the school’s website.