Learning Objective #1: Discuss how a virtual laboratory is designed and conceptualized

Learning Objective #2: Discuss the "lessons learned" from the experience of designing and implementing a virtual laboratory

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The Far Eastern University Institute of Nursing opened the first virtual laboratory in the Philippines in December of 2005 and named it the Virtual Integrated Nursing Education Simulation or VINES Laboratory. Prior to this, no virtual laboratory ever existed in the Philippines.

The impetus for the move to put up the first virtual lab in the Philippines was the desire of the university to change the landscape of Philippine nursing education and bring it up to the level of global standards.

A design team,composed of faculty members and a nursing consultant, was formed. The steps toward the creation of the VINES were as follows: Obtaining administration support, benchmarking, conceptualization, design, construction, installation, punchlisting, hand-over, infrastructure and capability-building, opening, and operations.

Today, the FEU-IN VINES Laboratory is the "gold standard" in Skills Laboratories in the Philippines.