Meta is launching a brand new hub for Quest headsets later this 12 months that ought to make it simpler for educators to make use of them in faculties. In a weblog put up on Monday, Nick Clegg, Meta’s president of worldwide affairs, writes that the hub will let academics entry “education-specific apps and options,” together with instruments to handle all Quest headsets within the classroom.
Meta nonetheless hasn’t launched the identify of the academic product, nor a listing of particular options. Nevertheless, Clegg notes that Meta needs the hub to make it “simpler for college kids to study, apply and observe new expertise” whereas additionally seeing locations or having experiences which may not be attainable exterior of digital actuality.
In an interview with Axios, Clegg says Meta’s Quest headsets might let college students stroll the digital streets of historic Rome. “And other people can giggle and say, ‘Oh, look, there’s Brutus plunging a knife into the again of Julius Caesar,’” Clegg tells Axios. That certain sounds… pretty.
Regardless that some faculties are experimenting with digital actuality, Meta’s program may not be one thing each establishment can afford, relying on how a lot it prices. The academic hub will solely grow to be obtainable to colleges serving college students 13 years and older and solely in markets the place Meta’s workplace-focused Quest for Enterprise subscription is supported. Meta launched Quest for Enterprise final fall, which comes with person, system, and customized app administration and prices $14.99 per system per thirty days.
Over the previous 12 months, Meta has been exploring purposes for its VR headsets in faculties. Final September, Meta offered 15 universities within the US with Quest headsets and stated it was experimenting with methods to spotlight academic apps within the Quest retailer. Whether or not different faculties and universities will wish to hop on board the Quest practice with out donations from Meta stays one other query.