EDUCAUSE Virtual Worlds Constituent Group

EDUCAUSE have announced the creation of a new Virtual Worlds Constituent Group.

One does not need to be a member of EDUCAUSE, or pay anything, to belong to/participate in the listserve or for many of the EDUCAUSE online resources. I have been an active member of EDUCAUSE, and on a few of the other CG's, for a number of years now and find them very useful. For a list of other EDUCAUSE CG's, please check here http://www.educause.edu/ConstituentandDiscussionGroups/318. There is also an in-world group you can join called EDUCAUSE Virtual Worlds, which already has over 75 members! Just do a SEARCH in the GROUPS tab for EDUCAUSE.

The creation of the Virtual Worlds Constituent Group marks a great commitment of resources by EDUCAUSE and will also expose the idea of virtual worlds to a large and growing audience. The support we received for the Hot Topic Discussion at EDUCAUSE's Annual Conference this last October in Seattle was impressive. In fact, the idea of teaching and learning in a virtual environment drew big crowds for each session. People were sitting on the floor for our Hot Topic Discussion, they had to turn people away from Joanna Robinson's presentation, and there were over 200 people at the panel discussion that included several of our fellow SLEDers (congrats to all!).

As a side note, EDUCAUSE is in the process of accepting proposals for pre-conference and main conference sessions at next October's Annual Conference in Orlando. The deadline for pre-conference submissions is January 14th ( http://www.educause.edu/14774) and the deadline for main conference sessions is February 11th (http://www.educause.edu/14767). Here's a excellent opportunity to share the great work you are doing at, I believe, the largest technology in education conference of its kind.