Presentation description

Focused on the refugee community and the lack of education around emerging technology, Bridging the Gap is a collaboration between the University of Utah's College of Architecture and Planning's Multidisciplinary Design (MDD) division and the International Rescue Committee (IRC). Led by Milad Mozari, an immigrant of a similar resettlement process to the refugees, the project is an educational platform through virtual reality to increase digital literacy and empowerment. As populations continue to shift globally, more families are forced to relocate, and the capacity of resettlement organizations exceeds their bandwidth. For example, IRC clients have expressed a lack of caseworker support on weekends. To address this pain point, Bridging the Gap provides virtual reality videos for resettlement that are presented to newly arrived refugees at Cultural Orientation meetings at the IRC, where clients can |take headsets home with them to rewatch.