YORKTON – A virtual reality exhibit at the Career Explorations event held on Oct. 18th at the Flexihall gave youth attendees a chance to try out prospective careers.
"It's a suite of activities that simulate what it's like to do these jobs in the real world," said Kelly Ireland of the Regina District Industry Education Council.
"This is just one of 28 scenarios that we have," said Mark Edmonds, Executive Director of RDIEC, adding, "if kids read through the list of the 28 programs and there's an interest there, we basically give them an opportunity to kind of delve into the career," and "there's 28 different programs, this is the HVAC (Heating Ventilation and Air Conditioning) repair person."
"In this scenario you get a phone call from the building owner that says, 'hey, my building is really hot, come and fix my air conditioning'," said Ireland, adding, "so these guys show up on the roof of a building and they have an assistant that they can listen to on their watch or they can read the manual and it basically says, 'hey, there's these four problems with the system, you need to figure out how to fix each of those."
The VR program uses an Occulus VR headset to give users an immersive experience.
"When you grab something, you're really holding it and if you let go it drops," said Ireland, adding, "it's a really cool way to give kids a chance to try some different career experiences that they otherwise wouldn't get a chance to."
Ireland, a recently retired teacher, said he spent the last ten years of his career as a School Administrator, but was a technology consultant for Prairie Valley School Division prior to that.
"This is kind of going back to those days for me where I got to work with the technology and really get to see kids get excited about the different things that they can do with technology...just having those ways to experience learning outside of the traditional classroom setting or even getting out in the field—this is kind of a bridge between those things," said Ireland.
"As a recently retired teacher, this is a great way for me to stay connected to students but also express my love and appreciation of technology," said Ireland.
Ireland said that the VR experience is a great way for young minds to learn and experience new things.
"The best learning scenario, or the best learning situation, is when you don't realize that you're learning—you're just having fun—and that is kind of like going back to as a child when you're just soaking up every experience around you and everything that you do is learning, but you're having fun doing it."
"To be able to give some potentially jaded teenagers a chance to do that and then to maybe—if you have some discussion with them afterwards—open up their eyes to just the possibilities of some of these things that they found really fun here —this could turn into a career for you," said Ireland, adding, "you may not know what you're doing in grade 10 or 11, or—heaven forbid—12, but if you've experienced something like this it gives you an idea of where you might want to go in the future."
"Basically we try and connect kids grades 7-12 to a career path of choice – so we try and base it upon their interests and their passions," said Edmonds of the his organization, adding, "we try and give them as much information about a potential career possibilities for themselves that they might have questions about...moving through the education system and eventually graduating and going out into the work force."
When it comes to the VR portion of RDIEC, Edmonds said that the organization works closely with Regina Work-Prep and Careers Labs VR, the designer of the software they use.
"Kids basically go in, they get into the program and virtually get a real feel for what the career might be like, so this is just giving them an idea of what an HVAC person does," said Edmonds, adding, "it's very applicable, this gives kids an opportunity to kind of do some hands on stuff—virtually of course—but as close in a simulation as you could possibly get to the real thing."
"RDIEC is a non-profit corporation established in 2013 as a result of industry education councils being highlighted as best practice in the Government of Saskatchewan's Framework for Provincial Education Plan 2020 – 2030," read a description from the organization's website.
"Our mandate is to help all of southern Saskatchewan, so we've partnered with all the southern school division; Chinook, Good Spirit, Sunwest, South-East Cornerstone and Prairie South – basically everything Saskatoon South," said Edmonds.
"Connecting education to industry is what we do," said Edmonds.
