Needs The importance of health & social services is increasing as European society grows older and unemployment and relocation across Europe increases. This growing demand for services, a public sector provision in many Member States, is creating unprecedented pressures on health & social care systems. Despite differences in political approaches and institutional frameworks, health and social services in all Member States face similar challenges in adjusting to demographic ageing, societal change, rising expectations and consumerism, changing employment and family patterns, evolving technological opportunities and funding issues. A key part of the sector deals with vulnerable people. A recent report by the Social Protection Committee stated that greater emphasis must be spent on generating an effective and innovative way of developing the human capital of those responsible for making a significant professional impact and successful intervention in improving the quality of life for vulnerable people throughout Europe. Education and training plays a pivotal role in developing those who work with vulnerable people. In many parts of Europe, the sector has a strong emphasis on learning and assessing skills for job roles in real practice environments (“practice learning”), which in some qualificationscan be almost 40% of the total learning time. There are also on-going demands for practice learning with new qualified professionals and as part of “in-service”/CPD training. There are clear logistical challenges in arranging practice opportunities where trainees are able to learn the core skills of the job and receive high quality support, supervision and assessment of their practice from suitably qualified mentors/practice assessors. Further, finding sufficient numbers of such placements has been a challenge for the last 30 years. However, there are also other challenges; eg. risks associated with work-based learning and the safety and well-being of service users in giving trainees access to their lives. Meeting the needs To address these challenges, this project will develop an immersive 3D virtual environment, built on gaming architecture and driven by emotional AI, to provide a safe and readily accessible environment where Higher Education and VET students and professional social workers who deal with vulnerable people can learn by interacting with NPCs (Non-Player Characters) in a simulation of a real world service. Trainees will engage with simulations and be required to navigate their way through choices to arrive at the best resolution. Each simulation can be replayed and evaluated by the trainer/mentor and the trainee can use the same simulation as many times as required. We see this as offering a measurable, controlled environment where learners can gain a command of the basics of the job role they are training for with minimal resource requirements and zero risk to the public, thus providing a sound basis from which to progress to real work practice placement. The expected results of the project are: - a pedagogy and curriculum that can be used by educators to train HE/VET students and professionals who work with vulnerable people in a simulated practice learning environment. The curriculum will be aligned with ECTS/ECVET. - a 3D game platform for supporting practice learning, developed to be multi-lingual to support teaching in different European languages. - training materials for the teachers, mentors and assessors who will use the game. - training for 200 teachers/teacher trainers using the materials and the simulated practice environment. - large-scale piloting of the simulated practice environment across Europe with HE/VET students and professionals who deal with vulnerable people. - in-depth analysis of the training and piloting. - development of policy and practice guidance for policymakers/decision makers on the benefits of the simulated practice environment. - establishment of an online Community of Practice to continue the use of the platform after the project has completed. - widespread dissemination of the results of the project. - assessment of the commercial value of such a game. Impact • 500 HE/VET students and social services professionals trained using the game; • 200 teachers/teacher trainers trained; • Community of Practice with at least 500 members. Partners As well as partners covering HE/VET providers, HE/VET policy makers and the labour market, the project also required technology partners to develop the educational game. Developing educational games is an interdisciplinary enterprise requiring the technical skills of games developers, the domain knowledge of the subject expert (social work with vulnerable people), an understanding of the pedagogy and psychology of games as well as knowledge of educational interventions and evaluation. The selected partners have been carefully chosen for their expertise in these different subject areas.