More faculty are supplementing their lesson plans with ‘extended reality,’ or XR learning, which includes virtual and augmented reality. Horns blared as cars and motorcycles angled their way along a busy street lined with vendors at a large outdoor market in Sierra Leone. “Alright, we are now at the clock tower in central Makeni, and we are about to go into the busy marketplace,” Khanjan Mehta, vice provost for Creative Inquiry and director of the Mountaintop Initiative, said, shouting over the sound of trafc and distant music. Down a side street on this hot January afternoon, there was barely room to move. People squeezed shoulder-toshoulder, women balanced baskets on their heads brimming with fruits and vegetables, and vendors under colorful umbrellas called out vying for attention. Mehta had expected to bring a group of Lehigh Global Social Impact Fellowship students with him to this West African country, but the COVID-19 Omicron variant put a stop to that. Luckily, Mehta said, he was able to bring the experience back to the classroom, thanks to a GoPro 360-degree camera and a virtual reality headset. In addition to the market, he shot footage of the World Hope International ofces, the organization Lehigh partners with when traveling to Sierra Leone. He also shot video of the hotel where students will stay when they travel for feldwork in August and locations they will visit and collaborate with, such as health clinics, a school, a restaurant and some of the scenery. A big fan of Anthony Bourdain, the late chef and travel documentarian, Mehta said he channeled Bourdain’s energy while flming the scenes and explaining to studentswhat theywere seeing. Mehta is among the many Lehigh educators embracing the learning power of “extended reality,” or “XR,” a term that includes Khanjan Mehta S T O R Y CHRISTINA TATU I L L U S T R A T I O N S SOL COTTI technology such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). He plans to make similar videos in Kazakhstan and the Philippines this summer. The footage won’t take the place of actual travel, Mehta said, but it will help prepare students and give them confdence and cognitive fexibility going into a new situation. “They cannot smell it, they cannot feel it, but they can look around and really be immersed in the sounds, in the views of these places, and it increases their confdence level,” he said. Knowing what to expect before they travel to a new location helps students be prepared to ask better questions and identify issues they may not have considered as they work on their projects on campus, Mehta explained. For example, students designing a novel diagnostic device have to consider the clinical setting and the climate in which it will be used and how it could be afected by environmental factors like sunlight and heat. “I want them to ask better questions now in the design stage before they begin testing with their in-country partners,” he said. Across campus, eforts are underway to make XR technology more accessible to professors and their students. In addition to Mehta’s immersive travel videos, the Ofce of Creative Inquiry has been funding virtual reality projects through its Mountaintop Summer Experience program, including a virtual tour of the Lehigh RiverWatershed, and a virtual reality training tool to improve interracial interactions and aid in diversifying the culture of those in the STEMfeld. Additionally, the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning (CITL) plans to create a new student-centered XR Lab to launch in the Fall 2022 semester in the E.W. Fairchild-Martindale Library Computing Center. It will become the primary location for students with an interest in doing handsS P R I N G 2 0 2 2 | 3 1
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