FiberKids! encourages rural students at Carencro High’s Academy of Information Technology (AOIT) in Lafayette, Louisiana, to explore the use of fiber technology, take online field trips, and explore live streaming, high-definition video conferencing with students in San Francisco. FiberKids! is a joint project of Louisiana Public Broadcasting, Lafayette Utilities System, Bay Area Video Coalition (BAVC) in San Francisco, and the Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise (LITE).
Louisiana Public Broadcasting is a participating partner in the Louisiana Optical Network Initiative (LONI), the state’s growing fiber optic network that runs throughout Louisiana, and connects Louisiana research universities with those in Mississippi and to National LambdaRail and Internet2. In late 2008, LPB teamed with AOIT and BAVC to create a fiber-based pipeline for sharing content, ideas, and expertise. Once the infrastructure was in place, in April 2009, FiberKids! and BAVC youth participated in a fiber-supported videoconferencing session, in which students presented digital media projects ranging from environmentally conscious video games to 3D visualizations of their future workspaces. During the summer of 2009, two AOIT seniors interned at LITE, where for three weeks they used 3D modeling software to build a data set that re-created (for the LITE Center’s “visualization cube,” which features six simultaneous display surfaces) the experience of a hot air balloon ride over hills and houses they similarly modeled.