Northport High School students are using artificial intelligence and virtual reality to  develop interviewing skills thanks to a grant secured by librarian Debra Cavaliere. 
The Media Literacy grant was provided by NYS Educational Media Technology Association (EMTA) to support media literacy within schools. Ms. Cavaliere then used her portion of the grant to purchase VR headsets containing the VirtualSpeech program which allows students to practice interview skills, speeches, business pitches and more.  
With four VR headsets now located in the NHS library, students from Academy of Finance and Academy of Information Technology, each of whom is required to participate in a summer internship, are using the headsets to practice their interviews. Using AI, the program asks them questions based upon their answers and provides them with an overall score and suggestions for how to improve their interview skills.
Junior AOF student Cory used the technology to prepare for an interview for an accounting internship. After receiving a high score on his AI interview, the program provided specific feedback based on his responses.  “The summary said that I should focus on real life examples and be more specific with my responses,” said Cory. 
Fellow junior Giovanna shared that the program asked her both basic and personalized questions, which was different than what she expected.  She feels it can help prepare her for the future, saying “the more practice I get, the better I will be at interviewing in the future.”
Ms. Cavaliere hopes to continue embedding the program and technology into additional opportunities to help student build confidence in public speaking and interviewing.