Fitzalan High School

SUCCESS STORIES

PART OF OSBORNE TECHNOLOGIES

Putting immersive learning at the heart

of a major school redevelopment

Location: Cardiff, UK | Project: Osborne Technologies’ Aurora immersive

classroom with Igloo Vision software

Date: September 2023 | Product: 7x8 metre Immersive Classroom

Introduction

When Fitzalan High School in Cardiff embarked on a sixty four million pound project to

rebuild their premises from the ground up, they wanted to ensure students had access to

future-thinking facilities that would enhance the outstanding teaching on offer.

As part of their redevelopment, Fitzalan approached Igloo Vision and Aurora Immersive

by Osborne Technologies to build an immersive classroom which could be used across all

departments and by students of all ages from 11-18.

Installed in September 2023, the Fitzalan Immersion Studio

is a big hit with students and staff, and has so far been

used for virtual ﬁeld trips to inspire creativity and to

celebrate the history and diversity of the Tiger Bay area in

Cardiff. It’s even hosted an immersive history lesson for the

Prince and Princess of Wales.

When designing a school for the 21st century, surely there should

be spaces like this to bring learning to life for young people. You

can read about it, you can look at a small screen, but actually

being in the room and experiencing it just makes things more

memorable, more understandable and we're going to really

beneﬁt.

The Prince and Princess of Wales visiting the

Fitzalan High School immersive room.

Mrs J Kemp - Assistant Headteacher

Fitzalan High School

Ysgol Uwchradd Fitzalan

The Hardware – The Fitzalan Immersion Studio is a three-walled immersive room powered by

eight Optoma projectors and an Igloo Immersive Media Player (IMP). The visual experience is

enriched by further sensory controls, including dynamic lighting, surround sound, wind

machines and scent diffusers, all controlled by Aurora’s command delivery system.

The Software – The immersive classroom runs using Igloo Core Engine (ICE), the operating

system for immersive spaces by Igloo Vision which makes it easy for educators to incorporate

immersive learning into their teaching.

The Result

After one term in its new premises, Fitzalan has already found plenty of ways to incorporate

immersive learning into the curriculum and the large, visually impactful space can easily

accommodate up to 35 students with plenty of room to move around and interact with the

display.

Here are some of the ways the immersive classroom is being used:

Immersive ﬁlms exploring local history

Fitzalan is located in one of Cardiff’s most diverse areas and

many of its students are descendants of seafarers who came to

work in Cardiff Docks and Tiger Bay. The ﬁrst piece of bespoke

content Fitzalan made for the Immersion Studio was a 360° ﬁlm

combining archive footage, images and text to explore the

history of the local community.

The Content – One of the big advantages of ICE is the ﬂexibility of the software, which is

designed to display almost any type of immersive or traditional content on any display –

including 360° video and specialist VR learning content. Fitzalan staff have been making use

of Igloo’s native integrations for YouTube 360° and Google Streetview, and have also been

creating their own immersive learning content using 360° video and presentations in

Microsoft Sway.

The Product

The Fitzalan High School immersive classroom with a selection of images and ﬁlms about the history of Cardiff Docks and Tiger Bay.

Exploring different ecologies in biology

One of the great things about an immersive classroom like

Fitzalan’s, is that it’s so easy to enhance the current curriculum

with immersive content and bring difﬁcult spatial concepts to life.

For example, teachers have used the space to explore the ecology

of aquatic environments in biology or different landscapes in

geography.

Bringing history to life

History students have been learning about life in the trenches

during the First World War by experiencing CGI and reenacted

360° content about trench warfare.

Going Forward

Fitzalan High School are only just getting started with their new premises. Over the following

year staff will be looking to roll out use of the immersive classroom across the curriculum so

that every subject and student beneﬁts from immersive learning.

I think the staff were really pleasantly surprised with the

kind of interface and how easy it was to use certainly in

the initial set up.

To ﬁnd out how we can bring your next project to life,

T: +44 (0)1226 29455 E: info@auroraimmersive.co.uk W: auroraimmersive.co.uk

Mrs J Kemp - Assistant Headteacher

Virtual ﬁeld trips to the Supreme Court of the United States

When learning about American politics, sixth-form students have

the opportunity to speak via video call with a member of the

Supreme Court. Now with the immersion studio, students can

also take a virtual tour of the courtrooms.