Unfair Park from p6 how children and adults were interacting with each other in some of the user-gener- ated experiences. When the BBC reporters hopped into Roblox, they saw some disturb- ing things, like a virtual crowd gathered around a couple openly having sex. "Who wanna sex," one Roblox player said in the chat. The game manufacturers told Bloomberg in 2020 that two-thirds of U.S. children be- tween 9 and 12 years old play Roblox. A fter all of STEMuli's research, what they came out with was their educa- tional metaverse. They launched the platform at Dallas Hybrid Prep. The students are in grades four through six. Next year, the academy will grow to grades three through eight. Stu- dents at Dallas Hybrid Prep get a MacBook Air, an iPad, a high-speed hotspot and an Apple pen. “This school year has proven to be suc- cessful,” DISD spokesperson Robyn Harris said. “We plan to expand our program to serve students from third to eighth grade to continue this work and prepare our students for high school success. A blended learning model is sustainable beyond our current en- vironment. With strong academics, de- signed and engaging online learning, this can also be replicated.” Shead said their platform works a lot like Roblox. “As the students do these great things that contribute to them growing and learning, they earn internal game points,” Shead said. “What our system will do is, we’ll then convert those game points to crypto currency.” Along these lines, they looked at an on- line game called Axie Infinitey, a game with its own economy centered on Ethereum- based cryptocurrencies. This model is called “play-to-earn.” In STEMuli’s educational metaverse, it would be “learn-to-earn.” “We do plan to open up a token and start what we’re calling a STEM token,” Shead explained, referring to unique digital cre- ations that can act as currency. “That token would actually have real monetary value, and the students at any point in time would have the option to convert they’re digital STEMuli points into stem tokens.” These tokens could even be changed into real world money to pay bills. “If a family needed to be able to pay a wa- ter bill, they could go to STEMuli, do these things, earn some money and cash that out to be able to pay a water bill,” Shead said. “That’s really what we aspire to do with that reward system.” The company could also integrate corpo- rate partners into the reward system. “Imag- ine as a student, if you get a streak of going to school for two weeks straight or 30 days straight, you could go to your local McDon- alds and cash out an ice cream cone,” Shead said. “We dream of not only digital rewards and crypto currency, but everything in be- tween and how we can really get students motivated to learn through fun things they can do in their community.” Shead also said students could one day 8 have the chance to make investments with their STEMuli money. Kathy Tran “I’ve gained $10,000 this year of STE- Muli game points. I think I want to buy land in STEMuli and I think I want to monetize that land by either building a retail shop or building a house that people are renting out,” Shead explained. “In this world, we can help students build businesses and take them public within this metaverse. So, as far as what’s to come, all of that’s to come. We’re teaching kids education can help you grow your wealth, and once you grow your wealth, here’s how you can invest that so you can continue to grow your wealth and contribute to society.” As the platform grows, it will be rolled out to even more students in the district. To protect students on their platform, Shead said, they use a system that limits ac- cess to users approved by the school district. She said when they open up the platform to the general public, creators will have to go through a certification process before they can make and publish content in the STE- Muli metaverse. This content will be moder- ated by a team of educators. During school hours, Shead said teachers are still the ones watching the students in the digital classroom, but students will have access to the STEMuli metaverse after school hours as well. During this time (or whenever teachers aren’t around), Shead said they use a content moderation system built by Microsoft that flags inappropriate content and behavior. “The bad behavior is then reported to our system and teachers and students are auto- matically blocked from continuing commu- nication until an admin approves them to resume normal play,” Shead explained. While the metaverse is largely billed as a virtual reality experience, DISD is more fo- cused on getting the platform on all stu- dents' devices than they are trying to provide students with VR headsets like Me- ta’s Oculus Quest, high-tech, motion-track- ing goggles that lets wearers move about interactive, 3-dimensional virtual worlds rather than simply displaying scenes on 2D screens. “Since we do serve large public schools, the idea that they are going to go purchase $300 headsets for students when a Chrome- book might cost them $300. It’s just not where they’re at yet,” Shead said. VR will be incorporated eventually, but Shead said she’s worried about equity in these new digital spaces. “My fear in this world is that crypto cur- rency and metaverses and all these new technologies come out, but if there’s not an organization like STEMuli standing in the gap saying we’re going to bring up every- body with us, then I’m afraid we’re recreat- ing what we’ve already done in our history by leaving a lot of people out, and therefore creating and exacerbating all the gaps we’ve all seen in the world.” Shead said she grew up hearing the haves have computers and Wi-Fi and the have- nots don’t. In Dallas, a city struggling to close a digital divide among its residents, this is largely still true. Dallas Chief Information Officer Bill Zie- linski said during a recent webinar that be- fore the pandemic, many residents in the city used free Wi-Fi at places like local li- braries and community centers. When those facilities closed, these residents didn’t have access to the internet or other computer ser- vices. The city has been working to close this gap. “One of the things that we’re really super focused on right now is the issues in and around the digital divide," Zielinski said. "Not every portion of the city, not every resi- dent in the city, has the same kind of access to digital services that other residents of the city do.” Students at Dallas Hybrid Prep and their families explore STEM activities at a family event for the school in July 2021. One of the bigger challenges, Zielinski said, is updating Dallas’ broadband infra- structure. Broadband infrastructure in northern Dallas is newer than it is in the southern part of the city. He said he hopes to use federal dollars to bridge this divide. Shead said they built the platform from the ground up, side-by-side, with the com- munity and she thinks this will help ensure they’re services are equitable. She also said DISD has worked hard to connect students through a local, state and federal program called Operation Connectivity. However, the pandemic has shown schools aren’t just learning facilities for chil- dren. They provide counseling services, child healthcare and meals for students. They also provide free childcare for working parents who can’t be home during the day. “I do imagine the in-person learning expe- rience will persist because it does a lot for our system, like childcare just as an example,” Shead said. “But what I do see in the future, is STEMuli almost being this universal school where, no matter where you are in the world or what language you speak, you can go to this application and assess what you know and it can start to give you games and differ- ent things to improve your learning.” The physical education system also em- ploys a lot of people, from school nurses to bus drivers. Shead said she doesn’t think their platform will replace teachers or phase out some of these other jobs. “STEMuli will one day replace text- books,” Shead said. “If you look at it from that lens, STEMuli will not replace teachers, or the jobs public education provides.” In- stead, the platform will “provide right on MARCH 10–16, 2022 DALLAS OBSERVER CLASSIFIED | MUSIC | DISH | CULTURE | UNFAIR PARK | CONTENTS dallasobserver.com
