For the first time in history, the Comenius Teaching Fellows grant has been awarded to a lecturer from HZ. Just before the summer holidays, Lubi Möhlmann from the Nursing program learned that she would receive the prestigious grant. The grant amounts to 50,000 euro for the project ´Virtual conversation techniques: AI and VR as a bridge between theory and practice in nursing'.
She submitted the application together with Loek van der Linde, manager of the JRCZ Data Science Lab. The Comenius Teaching Fellows grant is intended for projects that innovate education. With the funding, lecturers can put their vision into practice. Möhlmann and Van der Linde want to use Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Virtual Reality (VR) to train students in professional conversations.
Closing the gap
Students often struggle with, for example, diagnostic or bad-news conversations due to a lack of practical experience, the limited availability of actors, and training environments that usually do not resemble real-life situations. “With this project, we want to close the gap between school and professional practice,” says Lubi.
An AI-powered VR application should make this possible. Once the tool is developed and tested, students will be able to conduct realistic professional conversations anytime, anywhere. They will do this 'in a realistic hospital environment' and receive immediate feedback on their conversations. Thanks to AI, each conversation will be slightly different, making it more aligned with real professional practice.
Other study programs
The tool could also be used in programs such as Social Work and Tourism Management. Möhlmann and Van der Linde aim to develop and test the tool within a year and a half. One of the requirements is that they share their knowledge with other universities of applied sciences.