Work-in-Progress—A 360 Virtual Reality Simulation to Prepare Social Work Students to Interact with Community Environments

Social work educators utilize theories to teach students about the correlations that exist between the environment and an individual's development. Students, however, do not apply these theoretical perspectives with consistency when interacting with people within their communities. Virtual reality (VR) can be a scaffolding tool used to address this disparity. This work-in-progress paper describes a 360 VR tool aimed at immersing students in a typical NYC neighborhood. Pre- and post-performance of students who engaged with the VR tool showed statistically significant learning gains and positive effects on VR use, value, and satisfaction with the experience.