By Brenda Flanagan
Correspondent
Millions of people visit Ellis Island every year, it’s a portal to the past where 12 million immigrants lined up to enter the U.S. through the Great Hall. How did that feel a century ago? Here’s a way to virtually experience that reality, which started with a physical inspection.
Using virtual reality headsets, 15 students from Bergen County Academies worked more than three years to design and write code for an educational app that lets you go back a century in time, walk through the Great Hall and interview three immigrants who just got off the boat from Europe.
What is it like on Ellis Island? “It is very confusing! So many people in one big room all speaking different languages,” the app replied.
“The idea here is you can go up to them and you can talk to them and you can learn about the immigrants that were coming to his country. So we’ve actually incorporated oral histories that we’ve received from the National Park Service,” said Bergen County Academies senior Neel Patel-Shah.
“Our goal is ultimately to make this something available to the public so that you’ll be able to download it and use it on your headset no matter where you are,” said Scott Lang, interactive design instructor for Bergen County Academies.
For the Park Service, it’s using high-tech outreach to tell real, intimate stories.
“To make people care about Ellis Island and say ‘Wow, that’s a pretty cool experience! Maybe I should go there!'” said National Park Service Deputy Superintendent John Hnedak.
Students measured the vast venue and researched hundreds of historic documents, photos and interviews with immigrants who tell harrowing stories. One woman’s mother and brother both fell ill and were taken away.
“My brother has just been diagnosed with measles so now I am alone. I do not know if they are still here, or if they have been sent back,” said one of the virtual immigrants.
For these young, college-bound designers it’s a complex project that grounded their modern reality in U.S. history.
“As high school went on, as I worked on this project, I saw why places like Ellis Island are such an important place in our history because it is a country of immigrants. So I did develop a connection with it that way, through my family because I know they are immigrants,” Patel-Shah said.
Actually talking to people who stood waiting on the threshold of a new life in a new country really does grab students’ attention.
“This is more interactive, so you’re probably going to retain more information about it. Especially because it’s going to have more of an impact on you than just reading a book, being able to see everyone and how it used to be,” Mather High School student Ismail Ahmed said.
The project is ongoing. Students plan to add more profiles, more details, more dramatic voices. The app should be available for free download on a game portal sometime this fall.