2013 Mental Health Symposium in Second Life

virtual-abilitySome more great work from Virtual Ability, Inc, with this Saturday seeing a Mental Health Symposium. You can find out more on the Virtual Ability blog but here’s the schedule:

Will you Treat ME?  Funding mental health care treatment – now and under the Affordable Health Care Act
KEYNOTE PRESENTATION
Presenter: Jayme Nelson, RN, MS (SL Avatar: Jayme Xaris)
Saturday April 27, 2013 7-8 am PDT

Sudden Violent Loss: Its Impact on Every Member of the Community
Presenter: Deborah Houston-Schrenzel (SL Avatar: Brede McDonnell)
Saturday April 27, 2013 10-11 am PDT

Poetry and Mental Health
Readers: Eliza Madrigal, Zen Arado, Szavannah Resident
Saturday April 27, 2013 11:30am-12:30pm PDT

Introducing the Whole Brain Health Fair to Second Life
Presenter: Lissena Resident
Saturday April 27, 2013 1-2pm PDT

Exploring New Ways of Evaluating Mental Capacity of Seniors
Presenter: Kara Bennett, Ph. D. (SL Avatar: Dancers Yao)
Saturday, April 27, 2013 2:30-3:30pm PDT

Herbal Medicine and Mental Health
Presenter: Richard Roth (SL Avatar: Farm Gartenberg)
Saturday, April 27, 2013 4-5pm PDT

Virtual Ability Island: Big Week of Activities

virtual ability islandLongstanding hub for health and community services information, Virtual Ability Island, has a big week of activities ahead that I wanted to give a plug to.

First, the summary of the events:

Virtual Ability Community Events, week of Feb. 4-10

**Events marked are open to the public. All other events are for VAI community members and their invited guests.

TUESDAY Feb 5
2:30pm SLT- Woodget’s Weekly Quiz Night- VAI Sanctuary Beach Cafe

WEDNESDAY Feb 6
**1pm SLT- SL Limits (Part 2)- Yellow Hibiscus Cabana

THURSDAY Feb 7
**10am SLT- Shot in the Dark (flu vaccination)- Healthinfo Island Research Pavilion
1pm SLT- The Content Tab- VAI Sanctuary Building Classroom

FRIDAY Feb 8
**11am SLT- Second Life’s Little Secret- Sojourner Auditorium
**noon SLT- What is One Billion Rising About?- Sojourner Auditorium

SATURDAY Feb 9
**8am SLT- About VWBPE 2013- Sojourner Auditorium
1pm SLT- Swim and Chat- VAI Sanctuary Beach Cafe

SUNDAY Feb 10
**noon SLT- Self-Advocacy: Who, How, and Why- Yellow Hibiscus Cabana
2-4pm- Pun-off Party and Dance- Dance Pavilion, VAI Sanctuary

All events brought to you by the Virtual Ability community. Please see individual event notecards below. If you have ideas for future VAI events, please contact iSkye Silverweb.

And then the detail on the key events:

SL Limits (Part 2)
PRESENTER: Slatan Dryke
WEDNESDAY February 6, 1pm SLT
Yellow Hibiscus Cabana, Virtual Ability Island
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Virtual%20Ability/44/138/23

How many…? How long…? As much as…? Second Life numerical limits that affect your inworld experience.

PRESENTER BIO: Slatan Dryke has extensive experience in Second Life, including volunteering as an Ex-SL Mentor/Trainer, RHN Q&A Group Co-Owner, PWT advisor, SAM/VAI Mentor, and Ajuda Brasil Mentor.

Presented in text, with optional Voice transcription.

(Part 1 of this mini class is not a prerequisite.)

***

A Shot in the Dark: Just how effective are Flu Vaccines?
PRESENTER: Kaznats Oh
THURSDAY February 7, 10am SLT
Healthinfo Island Research Pavilion
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Healthinfo%20Island/130/196/30

Have you gotten your flu shot? How effective are flu vaccinations anyway? Research will be presented in plain language, so you can make an informed decision.

PRESENTER BIO: Kaznats Oh (Richard Stanzak in RL) is a critical care nurse. He also worked as a molecular biologist for fourteen years, seven of them for Eli Lilly pharmaceuticals in both research and development.

As a traveling ICU nurse he has been employed at 26 different assignments. He has worked in major trauma units, transplant units, cardiac units and hospitals from 1150 beds to 8 beds. He has experienced first-hand the problems of healthcare and can certainly attest this is a national problem.

Stanzak is the author and/or co-author of several papers and also has several patents. He is the lead author of a benchmark paper on the cloning of genes responsible for the production of erythromycin. He was engaged in research at Eli Lilly when Prozac was first discovered and Genentech first licensed the insulin gene to Lilly. As a critical care nurse, he is responsible for providing teaching to patients or families about drugs, diseases and procedures.

Presentation in text, with optional Voice transcription.
(Repeat of session given Jan 17.)

***

Second Life’s Little Secret: A discussion
PRESENTER:  Saffia Widdershins
FRIDAY, 8 February 2013, 11am SLT
The Sojourner Auditorium, Virtual Ability
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Virtual%20Ability/53/172/23

Over the years, the question of gender in virtual worlds has formed the fodder for a wide variety of newspaper and magazine articles and several well-regarded academic studies in the wider world, and some fascinating blog posts from inworld. But one area that has been comparatively overlooked – and one that may have an important bearing on some of the problems that Second Life faces today, and some of its potential strengths that could ensure its longevity – is the demographic of age.
Saffia Widdershins discusses one of Second Life’s open secrets – the fact that the inhabitants of Second Life may well be older than they appear.

PRESENTER BIO:
Saffia Widdershins is the editor of Prim Perfect Magazine, the executive producer of treet.tv‘s Designing Worlds, Happy Hunting! and Metaverse Arts, and of the annnual telethon for Relay for Life. She helped organise SL9B, and runs regular talk and discussion events at major events, such as the Birthdays, the Home and Garden Expo and the Christmas Expos. She’s taken a role in publicising concerns over Second Life issues such as Intellectual Property Rights and griefing.  Currently she’s one of the team behind One Billion Rising in Second Life.

Presented in voice, with text transcription.

***

What is One Billion Rising About?
PRESENTER: Honour McMillan
FRIDAY 8 February, noon SLT
The Sojourner Auditorium, Virtual Ability
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Virtual%20Ability/53/172/23

What is One Billion Rising about? Honour McMillan explains!

One out of every 3 women in the world will experience violence during her lifetime which totals more than one billion. Women, and the men who love them, will participate will walk away from their homes, businesses and jobs on Valentine’s Day and join together to dance in a show of collective strength.

One Billion Rising in Second Life is an officially registered event associated with the real live movement. 24 hours, 24 performers and 24 artists on 4 sims.

PRESENTER BIO: Honour McMillan is an explorer, blogger and community event organizer in Second Life.

Presented in both Voice and text.

***

About VWBPE 2013
PRESENTER:  Kevin Feenan (SL: Phelan Corrimal)
SATURDAY February 9, 8am SLT
The Sojourner Auditorium, Virtual Ability Island
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Virtual%20Ability/53/172/23

Phelan Corrimal presents highlights on the upcoming Virtual Worlds Best Practices in education conference being scheduled for this July 2013. Find out about opportunities to present, volunteer, or just plain have fun at the conference.

PRESENTER BIO:  Kevin Feenan, also known as Phelan Corrimal in Second Life, is the President of Rockcliffe University Consortium and one of the Executive Directors of the VWBPE Conference. Originally started as a grassroots educational conference, the Virtual Worlds Best Practices in Education conference brings together over 2000 educators, researchers, and institutional professional from around the world to discuss issues facing education and how virtual technologies can best be applied to solving these dilemmas. The conference is run as an open source conference and is free for anyone to attend.

Presented in both text and Voice simultaneously.

***

Self-Advocacy: Who, How, and Why
PRESENTER: SIster Abeyante
SUNDAY, February 10, noon SLT
Yellow Hibiscus Cabana, Virtual Ability Island
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Virtual%20Ability/44/138/23

What is self-advocacy? Who can most effectively self- advocate? What are some tips to make self-advocacy more effective? What should you try if it doesn’t “work”? Why bother? Find out a bit more, and share some tips of your own in this presentation and discussion about self-advocacy for people with disabilities. Great for beginners and intermediates, but the experts and wisdom figures will help us too!

PRESENTER BIO:
Sister Abeyante (Sister Patrice Colletti, SDS, a Sister of the Divine Savior from Milwaukee, WI) is a long time disability rights advocate who has been widely involved in personal and systemic advocacy efforts. Starting at age seven, when she became deaf, she’s developed some “pretty darn effective!” approaches to helping people make better and more just choices, particularly related to inclusion and civil rights for people with disabilities. She currently works as an Inclusion Coordinator in an innovative, inclusive urban housing project near Milwaukee, WI.

Presented in text, with optional Voice transcription.

Environment education via a virtual mine

Virtual Mine is “an educational 3D environment, game, and educational curriculum for teachers, students, and anyone who’d like to learn more about mountain top removal, coal fired power production, alternative energies, and the amazing music and culture in the Appalachian mountains”. Which sounds a little staid on the surface, but the reality is an engaging and immersive education experience. I attended the launch tour this morning alongside around 35 others, mostly educators and developers, to see what was on offer.

Funded by the MacArthur Foundation and the Independent Television Service, the Virtual Mine consist of an entire island in Second Life. After equipping a hard hat and HUD, a series of processes can be controlled and viewed. Whether it’s tree-clearing, the removal of the mountaintop for mining, or balancing the nearby town’s energy needs with the environmental impacts of the mining and cola-fired power station, it’s all covered.

Have a brief look for yourself:

This is the sort of build that tends to shine a very bright spotlight on the opportunities virtual worlds provide for education, including environmental education. That said, one of the tour participants made a humourous comment during the ‘turn off all the unnecessary lights in the town’ exercise, asking that we shut down the region’s server in the process to truly save some power.

Some of my other snaps from the launch tour:

Tree clearing simulation


The blasting begins


Coal-fired power and its town impacts


Turn off the damn lights!

Congratulations to the developers of Virtual Mine and the wider support team. You can find out lots more information on the project here.

[Originally posted over at The Metaverse Journal]

The history of Second Life

Over the past two months I’ve been pretty immersed in virtual worlds history in regards to health innovations (for this book), and it’s certainly been an illuminating experience. That said, this post from Tateru Nino over the weekend is the most illuminating piece of virtual worlds history I’ve read in a long time.

Coinciding with Second Life’s 7th birthday celebrations, the first part of the history covers 1999-2002 – do yourself a favour and have a read. There is of course further parts on the way and I’ll add them here as they are published. If you end up on a history binge, don’t forget the Virtual Worlds Timeline site either.

The full history of Second Life as seen by Tateru Nino:

Part 1: 1999-2004
Part 2: 2005-2007
Part 3: 2008-2010 and beyond

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