SBIR Phase II: Education on Demand for Technique Training

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II project will develop and evaluate a delivery platform for interactive rich media and effective simulation-based e-learning. The platform will interface with learning content authoring and management systems that are scaleable to commercial operation without further development. Interoperability is achieved through verified compliance with the Advanced Distributed Learning Initiatives Shareable Content Object Reference Model, and the ability of the platform to directly admit and reuse e-learning assets in all pervasive formats. Rich media is represented in an object-oriented fashion that retains the identity of each media asset in order to: (1) facilitate courseware maintenance and reuse; (2) allow refined server bandwidth and storage utilization, and system scalability; (3) enable data rights management of individual assets and diverse revenue models; (4) render content as an interactive multimedia engagement that promotes attention retention and the refinement of learner skills without the need for special hardware; (5) tailor content to diverse client platforms, distribution channel configurations, and the individual demographics, curriculum certification, and physical handicap of the learner; and (6) enable client-side rendering of high-definition content not possible to deliver pre-rendered over conventional Internet access. The proposed system enables learners to receive courseware of higher audiovisual quality, greater interactivity, more refined personalization, and with greater learner retention than that possible with current streaming technologies. Interoperability with existing learning content management systems, and scalability to large and diverse audiences strengthen commercialization potential. Enabling technologies that rely on rich-media delivery, such as collaborative visualization and distributed interactive simulation, are also supported by the proposed object-oriented rich media representation.