Learning Alliance has come up with an innovative way to tackle wireless industry training: through virtual gaming. By creating gaming environments that create unique learning experiences for students and industry professionals, the company hopes to engage, attract, educate and retain wireless infrastructure workers across the spectrum.
The gaming platform was developed by obtaining feedback from industry partners, leaders, and experts to create what the company deems is “a true tower experience.”
“Learning in a virtual capacity to gain mental repetition and develop good habits will help support best practices in our industry,” said Cesar Ruiz, CEO of Learning Alliance (LAC). “We went into this gaming development project with the idea of a realistic and true-to-the-industry environment,” he said.
The game is built in Unreal Engine 4 and can be upgraded to Unreal Engine 5 in 2021, maintaining the graphical and fluid integrity of the user experience.
“I wanted there to be a realistic perspective of a cell site that you just do not see in other virtual environments out there, so we went with modern development tech. The user is able to interact with almost every component on a cell site where they can inspect equipment for soundness, prepare for a climb, manage their exhaustion and verify safety,” said Fred Arnold, Director of Operations, LAC. The environment is equipped for the user to experience safety requirements through a meter-based approach. As the meter climbs, the user has a specified amount of time to correct the safety hazard or else the simulation restarts.
“We dissected safety standards to a new level so that safety and compliance are main drivers to a user moving forward in our gaming environment,” Arnold said, “if you miss attaching your vertical safety system, the simulation knows, and the user starts accumulating unsafe “point” values that reflect in a safety meter. It really makes safety a focus, so the student obtains the required repetition.” The virtual environment will connect to LAC’s TIRAP aligned Learning Management System, our phone application and can be utilized via any browser in the phone or a desktop.
Overall, a student is not limited to one device and that comes from its server-side infrastructure, according to LAC. “The strength in our virtual training comes from something called Experience API where we are creating fully customizable learning experiences that are tracked for accuracy and repetition,” Arnold said, “it interconnects training data transfers with no limitations from a LMS or stationary database.”
“We believe in learning anywhere, anytime! Our virtual gaming simulation will provide flexibility for candidates to develop their skills remotely on rain days or downtime that they experience while on the clock,” Ruiz said. Learning Alliance’s virtual gaming component will be available in 2021, but a specific due date has not been determined.
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