Does Augmented Reality Have a Place in Your University?

Miro Humer, Interim Vice President, University Technology and Chief Information Officer, Case Western Reserve University

Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) in Cleveland asks its community to “Think Beyond the Possible,” to go beyond current boundaries, challenge assumptions and move the needle forward.

Key university leadership visited Microsoft in 2014 for a first look at a new augmented reality (AR) device called the HoloLens,that was still under development. The CWRU team immediately knew the device had major potential for higher education and began plans to harness this exciting new technology.

This was an opportune and pivotal moment for the university to embrace the new technology, as a new state-of-the-art health education campus was being designed and built combining medical and nursing studies in one building, with an adjacent building for dental studies.

Based on the early look at the HoloLens, it was decided that the new building would not have a traditional cadaver dissection lab and that the HoloLens would be ideal for anatomical studies, prompting a significant CWRU commitment to this technology before any medical content was developed.

This decision also aligned with the recently launched Interactive Commons (IC) on the CWRU campus, a center designed to connect individuals through advanced visualization to further education and research. The IC consists of developers, artists, curriculum designers and faculty who were charged with designing a first-in-kind holographic anatomical studies program for the School of Medicine and, ultimately, for the Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing andSchool of Dental Medicine as well.

In 2015, development of the Holoanatomy® Software Suite began for first- and second-year med students. This included the creation of the anatomical models along with tools that allowed faculty to see students’ reaction to instruction in real time while also allowing students to interact with each other.

Throughout software development, the app was tested to ensure it was an effective tool for learners. An initial study compared the efficacy of this new approach to the standard cadaveric studies. A peer-reviewed study revealed that students using the Holoanatomy® Suite scored equally to students using standard instruction methods, but they learned the content in half the time. A subsequent study demonstrated that students also retain the content better.

The program was formally adopted into the core academic program in 2019.

The 2019 semester began with great anticipation as the university prepared to fully implement the result of five years of development effort. Initial results and feedback were very positive but interrupted when the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic threw the university into fully remote instruction in spring 2020.

"The IC consists of developers, artists, curriculum designers and faculty who were charged with designing a first-in-kind holographic anatomical studies program for the School of Medicine and, ultimately, for the Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing andSchool of Dental Medicine as well"

Until then, the HoloLens was used in one large classroom with the faculty member and tech support present. To continue in a remote environment, the developers updated the software within two weeks and shipped 184 HoloLenses to the students, allowing instruction to continue remotely in their homes with faculty using the developed instructional tools for a completely new level of engaged, remote instruction. The medical students never missed a day of anatomy class.

There were concerns about tech support for the students. Would they be able to resolve any technical issues by themselves? Would their bandwidth support the devices? Can we truly teach from anywhere to anywhere?

The transition went more smoothly than anyone could have hoped. Students were adept at using the devices and able to solve any minor issues that came up. Faculty were able to teach as they had before the pandemic; the tools developed by the Interactive Commons allowed them to interact with the students in a way that is impossible with other existing remote technologies.

This was a completely new way to engage students from anywhere with content that improved the educational process.

With the success of Holoanatomy®, CWRU has expanded the use of the HoloLenses into other disciplines as part of its Future of Learning initiative.

As of the summer 2022, the HoloLenses have been adopted for dance studies, art history, physics, classics, marine biology, crystallography, and planetary sciences with many more in development. This technology removes many barriers to instruction, offers flexibility for content delivery and an entirely new style of student/faculty engagement.

Content is delivered in an immersive and collaborative manner that allows students to live what they’re learning in a way that was not possible previously. The HoloLens experience at CWRU provides compelling evidence that AR not only has an important place in higher education, it is also just really cool.

Microsoft

Augmented Reality