UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Dylan Paré, who started in August as an assistant professor of learning, design and technology (LDT) in the Penn State College of Education, aims to discover new angles on social issues, such as gender and sexuality, through the lens of cutting-edge virtual reality (VR) technology.
“I was attracted to the LDT program because I saw scholars engaging in critical perspectives in science and technology,” Paré said. “To be around people who are really pushing forward how we can look at learning and technology critically, was really important to me.”
In addition to their faculty position, Paré is director of Queer Code, a design and research-based studio that designs, develops and researches new technologies, interactive art and storytelling with queer and trans experiences at the forefront. Paré co-designs virtual, immersive and interactive computational environments for learning about complex systems, computational thinking and technology design. Within this overarching research project, they research multi-agent systems’ design to demonstrate how interacting and reasoning with multi-agent simulations of gender and sexuality-based marginalization can help people understand gender and sexuality experiences as “complex, emergent, multi-level phenomena that involve dynamic interactions between individuals, groups and institutions.”
Paré also runs a live stream from VRChat with the Better Together VR crew, exploring virtual worlds and commenting on artistic, technological and societal aspects of design in social VR. The team also released an interactive, experiential learning VRChat world called NASA Perseverance Rover on Mars, where visitors virtually journey to Mars, drive an accurate model of the NASA Perseverance Rover and discover information about the NASA Perseverance mission.
Over the course of their career, Paré has integrated their background in gender and cultural studies with a comprehensive understanding of social and ethical issues surrounding technologies.
“For me, it was important to have that grounding in critical perspectives from academia and bring that into technology,” they said.
Paré previously worked as an educational consultant in gender and sexuality for workplace and community settings and in post-secondary student services for gender and sexual diversity, healthy relationships and sexual health education. They hold a master of arts in communication and culture and a bachelor of arts in women’s studies. Paré earned a doctorate in educational research, specializing in the learning sciences, from the University of Calgary’s Werklund School of Education.
“When I began my doctoral program, I wanted to look at new ways to get into a deeper, more experiential level of what it means to experience inequities through the stories of real people — but how can we augment that with technology so that it helps people make sense of inequity at more a systemic level?” Paré asked. “Using VR and other computer simulations really provided a way to visualize those issues at a systemic level.”
As a researcher and teacher, Paré said they aim to think critically about how we represent and support learning about equity issues within VR, artificial intelligence and other technologies.
“I think new technologies always impact society,” they said. “There is always push and pull because we want to push forward quickly with new technology. But how can we engage with these technologies responsibly?”
Paré explores those types of issues in the class they are teaching this fall, “Learning Technologies for Good and Evil.”
“I’m hoping to bring what I know into the classroom, and to introduce VR and computer simulations into some of those spaces,” they said. “I’m really excited for the opportunity to work with students as I build out a research program and design these technologies for use in teacher education and broader public education.”