Virtual reality project developed by Grimsby students

Career 6 students are developing crime scene investigation (CSI) Virtual Reality (VR) experiences.

The Grimsby-based provision, which is part of the TEC Partnership, has seen their Level 3 Forensic and Crime Investigation students take the lead on developing VR experiences to support new students in learning about fundamental CSI concepts.

The project, devised by Dany Green, Programme Lead for Forensics at Career 6, alongside Tom Hughes, Head of Career 6, has been supported by Heather Hannah from the TEC Partnership’s Innovate team, to help the students bring their ideas to life.

Tom said: “We wanted to explore ways in which we could use VR within the curriculum for science and forensics, the technology lends itself really well to aspects of learning about crime scene investigation.”

The outline brief to the students was to create something that could be used by new students at the start of their course, to learn some of the basics of CSI, and would also make a great resource for schools to try out as a taster activity to inspire young people to be interested in forensics and crime scene investigation. The students have chosen to focus on two separate concepts: The Seven Ss of CSI and the process of collection and examination of evidence following the chain of custody protocols.

I am extremely proud to see how well the students have worked on this project. They have developed their ideas from their initial plans to produce an immersive and interactive experience, taking ownership of the project from the very beginning, creating all of the media content, learning how to use the software and running consumer tests to improve their product based on user feedback. On top of their new technical skills, they have developed such a broad scope of wider skills through the project, including teamwork, working to a brief, responding to feedback and criticism, and presentation skills.

Tom Hughes

The students have created the experience using ThingLink and Class VR. Within the experience, users will be faced with crime scene scenarios in which they have to explore, read and interact with information, questions and polls, then go on to analyse evidence found around the crime scene.

Dany adds: “Students went above and beyond to produce a creative and professional product. They have continually made me so proud of them all year.”