CBSE, Meta Collaborate to Provide Knowledge of AR, VR as a part of School Curriculum

The central board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has partnered with the social Media & Tech giant Meta to provide education on Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR). The board is planning to train 10 Lakh teachers and 1 crore students in the next three years.

Social Media Giant Meta has already provided curriculum on Digital Safety, online well-being, VR and AR. CBSE officials also said that the AR & VR are the technologies of the future and they will be implemented as a skill subject in the course curriculum of the students.

As per the news mentioned in NDTV Meta and CBSE will democratise the high school curriculum by allowing students access to quality educational content online through modules which would be made available on CBSE’s website.

The announcement was made by Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg at Meta’s Fuel for India, 2021.

“I’m really excited about this partnership and I think it’s a huge opportunity to (invest in) this entrepreneurial spirit and bring some of these tools around the metaverse, and training to the education system here in India,” he said.

Speaking to Education Times, Biswajit Saha, director, CBSE, says, “AR and VR will be introduced as a skill subject for classes VI to VIII and it will be integrated into STEM education till class XII. The vision is to democratise and universalise STEM education. The students will get to learn the theory part and will also have projects and internships. We are also planning to have lab experiments to make learning more immersive and experiential.”

The students will be given theoretical as well as practical classes on AR & VR and to leverage its use in entrepreneurship. The topics that will be covered in this will be Digital Etiquettes, Well Being, Digital Citizenship, Digital Footprints, Cyber Safety and Security. Students would also be given the knowledge to take care of passwords. 

Joseph Emmanuel, director, CBSE (Academics), says, “All the technical aspects related to AR and VR at an age-appropriate level will be taught to the students in a well-defined way in this emerging knowledge domain. Also, the students will be made to understand both the theoretical as well as practical aspects of the new technology and the marks scored by the students will be added to their internal assessment.”