Meta, the metaverse-focused social media firm, helps universities get their own virtual reality campuses online. The corporate will be opening 10 virtual campuses as a part of its Immersive Learning project, which seeks to take training to virtual reality environments. In partnership with Victoryxr, an Iowa-based virtual reality education startup, Meta will make investments $150 million on this initiative.
Meta Getting Universities Into the Metaverse
One of the biggest applications of virtual reality and metaverse technology has to do with training and the possibility of virtual reality classes coming true. Meta, the social media behemoth, is executing this idea, helping 10 universities to launch their metaverse-based campuses.
One of these is the University of Maryland Global Campus (UMGC), which is an online university. The greater than 45,000 college students of the university will now be able to meet in a metaverse online to convene and share their experiences.
Daniel Mintz, chairman of the division of knowledge expertise at UMGC acknowledged:
We’ve never had a campus before, and now we’ve our first. It has a duck pond.
As a part of this plan, the college will provide 5 courses in the metaverse campus that may come at no further value when in comparison with non-immersive courses. Nevertheless, the college is restricted by the variety of headsets (required for the courses) it will possibly loan to college students.
Different institutions will also be a part of this mission: the University of Kansas School of Nursing, New Mexico State University, South Dakota State University, Florida A&M University, West Virginia University, Southwestern Oregon Community College, California State University, Dominguez Hills, and Alabama A&M University.
Meta’s Involvement
Meta is donating its Meta Quest headsets to those organizations for college students to have the ability to be included in the programs. One of the objectives of Meta’s Immersive Learning project is to extend the entry of scholars to those applied sciences by partnering with organizations and universities. A part of the $150 million investment Meta is making serves to ship headsets in partnership with Victoryxr, the corporate that’s designing the metaverse campuses.
Meta has additionally helped universities pay for the design and building of those areas, which may value $50k for a five to seven-building campus. Steve Grubbs, the founder of Victoryxr, stated:
Education is an exciting use case for the metaverse, and Meta Immersive Learning will help creators all over the world achieve expertise for the metaverse and create immersive experiences for learners.
Meta’s pivot to virtual reality has prompted the company to lose money, as its metaverse division, the Actuality Labs unit, reported losses of $2.8 billion in Q2 2022. The corporate additionally had its first bond issuance in August, promoting $10 billion in debt to spend money on metaverse merchandise and different initiatives.