NYU Lab Goes Remote During Shutdown
I founded The Brendan Bradley Integrative Technology Lab at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts (more below) which has become a survey-course led by three different technologists each year with students from Drama, Game Center, Interactive Media Arts, Interactive Telecommunications, Film and more.
When COVID-19 shutdown classrooms worldwide, our students had serendipitously just received Oculus headsets for their segment on virtual reality with Facebook’s Michelle Cortes. Not only did lab participants continue their coursework in VR, they also developed and presented their final performances in VR Chat with a secondary stream to Twitch for those without headsets.
BACKGROUND
In 2014, my life changed when I booked one of those rare jobs as an actor that offers financial security and creative freedom. Becoming “The Staples Guy” for three years and over fifty commercials and appearances worldwide was really my first opportunity to think about the future - not just financially, but creatively. When I thought of my early artistic activism with community-driven theater that encouraged dialogue about societal narratives, I was inspired to give back with an investment in a 21st Century approach to arts education. I hoped to foster the next generation of storytellers with new storytelling tools for creative diplomacy.
(Read more about the inaugural 2017 Lab)
I approached my alma mater to establish a grant for student-generated projects seeking to integrate new technologies and help fund their projects. Through the guidance of Ruben Polendo, Rachel Friedman, and Andrew Uriarte, the grant quickly became an elective Lab and then an actual course within Tisch School of the Arts.
(Read more about the 2018 Lab)
The Brendan Bradley Integrative Technology Lab has become one of the largest cross-departmental initiatives at New York University with (at least) three technologists from real-world extended reality companies sharing the curriculum and syllabus, introducing the students to the latest technology and collaborative cultures.