In February 2022, Elevate Aviation received grant funding through the Government of Alberta’s Workforce Partnership Program to create a virtual reality campaign to attract women and underrepresented groups to the aviation industry. 

Our virtual reality campaign “Reimagine Your Future”, addresses industry labour market needs by taking commonly recognized careers and demonstrating how they can be reimagined as careers inside the aviation industry. Each highlighted career will link a career in aviation with a well-known career outside of aviation to demonstrate transferable skills. With the largest barrier to entry into aviation simply being lack of awareness, this project will not only promote careers in aviation, but show women and other targeted demographics how accessible careers in aviation can be. Many careers in aviation do not require formal education, so we will also highlight the skills required for each job using informational hotspots within VR videos, with a goal of increasing the number of applicants to aviation careers. Working with industry partners, we will heighten the awareness of labour market opportunities and recruitment needs. Our campaign will direct women to available jobs in aviation in Alberta. Over 18 months Elevate Aviation and project partners will plan, develop, and produce a variety of VR videos and launch a campaign in early 2023.

Project Outcomes

The main outcomes of this project are to: (1) heighten awareness of careers in aviation through unique and innovative virtual reality experiences and (2) reach and attract underrepresented groups, closing the gender gap within industry companies.