Artificial Intelligence

What’s better than actually going to class and learning? Telling your online avatar to go to class and learn for you, of course.

The Luther College Nursing Department purchased land in Second Life this semester so that students can learn more about practices, disabilities and psychiatric illnesses.

Second Life, developed by Linden Labs in 2003, is an online virtual world where residents may interact via avatars and lead fantastical, simulated lives of their own, but in a fictional setting where human flight and teleportation is possible.

Associate Professor of Nursing Jayme Nelson was able to bring the classroom to a whole new level. With the assistance of LIS, she constructed a Luther College Nursing Retreat where nursing students meet up online within Second Life before participating on field trips.

One such fieldtrip takes place at a UC-Davis educational site. Residents in Second Life teleport to this particular island or parcel and learn more about psychiatric illnesses like schizophrenia.

“It shows participants what it might feel like to experience auditory and visual hallucinations,” Nelson said. “You get a sense of how challenging it actually is to try to live your life, because you’re trying to navigate your avatar through this kind of environment, and the whole time you’re seeing and hearing hallucinations.”

But while Second Life does offer these insights, it can also be somewhat distracting. Not only is Second Life intended for ages 16+ and free to download, with a user base of over one million, it is possible to teleport to less-than-educational islands.

“I had some ethical struggles with it,” Nelson said. “It’s a capitalistic market. As you can imagine, the internet has some unsavory sites, and Second Life does as well., and so that is one drawback. I try to minimize that as much as possible by selecting sites that are developed by educational facilities for students to visit.”

Still, many nursing students are prepared for this, and just want to be in an educational environment with no consequences.

Luther nursing students now have new opportunities to access real-life nursing situations outside of their clinicals in the Second Life setting.

“It’s a different way from reading it in a textbook,” nursing student Jessica Mietz (‘12) said. “You get to see it, you get to do it, but it’s not on a real patient. So you don’t get nervous, and if you make a mistake, it’s not that bad. It’ll just correct you and you’ll try again.”

For now, Nelson has incorporated an assignment into the curriculum which requires students to take four field trips and experience real clinical duties in Second Life.

She hopes to further improve upon the Luther College Nursing Retreat and perhaps build fieldtrips of her own during her sabbatical work this spring.

Meanwhile, many involved are enjoying a truly simulating experience.

“We’re always looking for videos on Youtube to help us with what we’re reading,” Mietz said. “So I think this’ll be a really good supplement that will be kind of fun.”

For Nelson, this is a healthy sign for a developing program.

“It’s been a fun way to learn in a different way,” Nelson said. “The sites that I’ve selected have a huge educational overlay. You can’t help walking out of the PTSD not understanding more about that sort of psychological problem.”