The New Taipei City Government in Taiwan and ViewSonic Corp., a leading global provider of visual solutions, have partnered to promote UNIVERSE by ViewSonic, an immersive 3D virtual environment designed for education, to schools at all levels in the city. This initiative will benefit about 400,000 K–12 students. The two organizations inked an agreement of collaboration to help schools become digital learning environments following a successful pilot program at Long Pu Elementary School in New Taipei City. Additionally, this week, ViewSonic showcased UNIVERSE in New Orleans, USA, at the ISTE Live 22 Conference & Expo.
"New Taipei City has been devoted to digital learning for years. We have observed that current online learning faces numerous challenges, such as a lack of interaction and sense of participation. UNIVERSE by ViewSonic simulates real-world interactions. Teachers and students can create personalized avatars to further engage with each other in this 3D space. Moreover, UNIVERSE can also be applied to cross-school teaching, thereby bridging the resource gap between schools. We look forward to having New Taipei City as the world's first city to adopt Metaverse for all levels of education, leading the way for schools all over the world in transforming how we teach and learn digitally."
- Chang Ming-Wen, New Taipei City Education Department Commissioner
"Current online education platforms still focus on unidirectional communication. It not only limits the development of interactive courses for educators but also makes it difficult to evaluate student engagement during classes. Students cannot easily interact with peers and are prone to feel isolated. UNIVERSE by ViewSonic is the strongest solution to resolve these issues by making online learning feel as if it were in-person. Through the cooperation with New Taipei City, all teachers and students will benefit from the most innovative learning pedagogies.
- James Chu, Chairman and CEO of ViewSonic
Immersive virtual learning environments, including classrooms, lecture halls, and collaborative areas, are offered by UNIVERSE by ViewSonic. Emojis, chat messages, and realistic spatialized audio are just a few of the simple and user-friendly alternatives available to participants for various forms of communication. Teachers can project content, design pop quizzes, and separate students into breakout rooms for group discussions thanks to digital teaching aids. Teachers can also connect to ViewSonic's myViewBoard platform and use its cutting-edge teaching capabilities through the built-in browser.