• http://www.slurl.com/secondlife/virtual%20ability/128/128/23
• www.VirtualAbility.org/LindenPrize.aspx

Virtual Ability is an ongoing project with multiple related elements tied to helping people with RL disabilities.

Virtual Ability Island houses our New Resident Orientation Course- a professional, high-quality, sim offering state-of-the-art newcomer learning experiences. Developed in partnership with Alliance Library System, through a grant from the National Library of Medicine, the island also includes facilities for classes and presentations. Recent examples include panel discussions on Caregiving, and a Health Care Community Discussion to provide input on policy issues by people with disabilities, submitted to the Obama administration.

The Virtual Ability group forms the focus of our Community for people with RL disabilities who have entered SL. We hold dances and events for group members, provide a place for them to set 'home' and offer housing options. Perhaps most important, we socialize - offering people advice on their SL activities, along with peer-support discussions about RL medical issues, conditions and assistive technology.

Virtual Ability, Inc., a 501(c)3 non-profit corporation, is the RL umbrella over our organization. We may be the first group to start in SL and then form an RL non-profit corporation based on our SL work. The non-profit helps us raise funds for our SL activities, and enhances our ability to connect with other RL global medical, education, media, and corporate organizations.

An essential aspect of our project is the emphasis placed on connections with other SL and RL communities. One example is the sessions we held between RL nursing students from Tacoma Community College and our members with disabilities. In these frank exchanges, nursing students heard first-hand perspectives on what it's like to receive ongoing or crisis care. Two key properties of Second Life play a role in the success of these sessions: 1) students can easily meet with people with a wide variety of disabilities in one setting, and 2) individuals who are isolated and for whom RL travel is difficult are able to participate in the virtual meetings.

Another tangible example of how Virtual Ability impacts RL is the work of the Virtual Ability Research Group, led by Gabrielli Rossini, a RL professor of social work. This group is composed of academic researchers: professors and graduate students interested in disability issues in virtual worlds or working in related fields. These researchers provide information on current RL research to the disability community in SL, as well as offer opportunities to participate as research subjects in RL projects. Serving as a research subject is one way that isolated individuals with disabilities can give back to the community that provides services to us. Several academic papers facilitated through this group are currently under development.

Finally, and most gratifying, are the numerous individual RL outcomes: the couple who come into SL to dance together because a disability has denied them this simple pleasure, the individuals we've connected to RL support groups, the quadriplegic who finds work as a SL DJ, the woman whose SL experiences have led to RL employment. These are real people for whom SL is not a game, not just a Second Life, but a real second chance at life.