Living Labs
As TAP works to identify and prototype useful emerging technologies, opportunities arise to establish assessment projects with other groups within the university. The living lab is a key component of a productive collaborative assessment process.
What is a Living Lab?
A living lab is a regular university space - such as a classroom or conference room - that serves as a staging area for technologies under assessment. The space continues to function in its primary capacity, with experimental technologies "turned on" as appropriate for assessment purposes. Users interact with the technologies under evaluation for the purposes of contributing to the assessment.
Living labs improve assessment outcomes and provide these benefits:
- Living labs expand ITS's partnership and engagement with the university
- Technology-driven innovation increases as a result of direct user collaboration
- Collaboration with partners and end users results in more useful assessments
- The living lab process facilitates technology transfer
Living Labs in the Assessment Process
Deployment to a living lab represents a key stage in a technology assessment. Technologies that graduate from the Collaborative Enterprise Lab are promoted to a living lab for evaluation by partners, end users, and other IT professionals. The results of the living lab assessment feed into TAP's technology tracking function and inform plans for production deployment of the technologies.
Living Labs Rollout Plan
TAP is planning to develop several living labs in a variety of contexts in partnership with ITS areas and other UNC groups. The plan is to start with a number of small group "smart spaces" and expand scope as appropriate.
The current "rough cut" living labs rollout plan:
- Abernathy conference room
- Undergraduate Library with ITS User Support and Engagement
- Multiple campus classrooms with ITS Teaching and Learning
- A designated space with School of Information and Library Science
- Selected spaces in ITS Manning
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