IEd starts to share virtual land for free for those educational institutes that participate the summit. The yearly renewal is easy - just participate next year too!
BOSTON, MA - March 29, 2010
- The Immersive Education Initiative today
announced that it will provide permanent virtual world land for one
year to every school and non-profit organization that has at least
one teacher, administrator or student in attendance at the
2010 Boston Summit this April. The
land, a full region of space measuring 256x256 meters in size
(65,536 square meters), would cost nearly $2,500 in Second Life at
the normal educational rate ($700 plus $1770 in annual maintenance
fees). The free land can be renewed each year, also free of charge,
by simply attending any Immersive Education Initiative Summit.
At the 2010 Boston Summit a series of special workshops and presentations
will teach educators how to copy or move their existing Second Life
objects and worlds onto the virtual land they receive, and they
will also receive free pre-made virtual worlds designed
specifically for education. In addition, Summit workshops will
teach educators how to install and run their own virtual world
servers on school networks ("behind the firewall") free of
charge.
"The Immersive Education Initiative
is chartered to design, develop, and disseminate open source and
royalty-free immersive learning tools, standards, and best
practices," remarked Aaron E. Walsh, Director of
the Initiative. "Our objectives are simple: put these tools in the
hands of educators, free of charge, and teach them how to use them.
Until today the cost of owning virtual world land has been
prohibitive for many educators. By making permanent virtual world
land freely available at the Summit, as well as entire pre-made
learning worlds, we continue to fulfill our mandate as a non-profit
consortium focused exclusively on immersive teaching and
learning."
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