Veterans Affairs Dept. plans to use virtual reality for training employees

The Department of Veterans Affairs wants to use virtual reality technology to enhance employee training by providing role-play sessions where employees can safely practice and build confidence in the use of skills they learned in the classroom, the agency announced. 

The VA plans to use virtual reality technology for the role-play sessions. 

The prototype will be built and piloted at the Reno VA Medical Center. The prototype needs to be built by 6/30/21, and the pilot will be run from 7/1/21 through 9/30/21. 

According to the VA announcement, “In accord with the iNET development model, we are mindful of two principles. First, we want to start small and fail small. Rather than making big up-front investments, we want to make smaller up-front investments, to allow us to pivot to user needs as we learn more about our users.” 

“Second, if pilot studies indicate a strong return on investment, we can expect iNET support to expand the scope of the pilot to include sites beyond Reno. Eventually, if impact is strong iNET may be able to pitch the innovation for broad implementation across VHA.” 

To learn more about the project and submit a proposal visit the posting HERE.