DEVELOPING VIRTUAL REALITY-BASED TRAINING MATERIALS IN COLLABORATION WITH HIGHER EDUCATION INSTITUTIONS AND COMPANIES

In this paper, we discuss the potential of virtual reality (VR) as a tool for workplace training and how companies and higher education institutions can collaboratively develop and produce training materials supported by VR technology. Our objective was to create models according to which such cooperationcan be practised. We used examples from two industries—healthcare and hospitality—because these industries are suffering from labour shortages, the EU and especially Finland are facing the challenge of underemployment of immigrants, and these industries offer suitable entry-level positions for immigrants. Although companies would like to hire immigrants, they do not have adequate means to test their competencies, and immigrants would like to show their real competencies rather than just linguistic competence. Using the living lab method, we created a three-step workplace training contentcreation model for the hospitality industry and a four-step model for the healthcare industry in cooperation with companies, immigrant training centres, immigrant associations, and two higher education institutions Keywords: Virtual reality, training material, higher education, health care and hospitality companies, living lab