Summary
Meta and CBSE will collaborate on content curation and development of curriculum integrating immersive technologies, Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR)
The partnership will also aim to empower educators with new age tools and skills
Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO, Meta (erstwhile Facebook) has announced that the company will expand its partnership with the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).
The partnership will aim to provide a curriculum on Digital Safety, Online Well-being and Augmented Reality (AR) for over 10 million students and one million educators in India.
With the government’s vision of universalising education, Meta and CBSE will democratise the high school curriculum by allowing students access to quality educational content online through modules. These will be available on CBSE's official website.
The first phase of ‘FB for Education’ initiative launched in June 2020 aimed to prepare students and teachers for the future of work and create a safe online environment and learning experience, saw over 500,000 students show interest in digital safety and online well-being and more than 14,000 teachers applied for training in Augmented Reality.
The partnership with CBSE underscores Meta’s commitment to India, and reflects the joint ambition to universalize STEM education by ensuring that students across India have equitable access to quality educational content which will prepare them for the ‘future of work’ in a digitally powered economy.
The partnership will also aim to empower educators with new age tools and skills needed to nurture the Generation Z and Generation Alpha students into responsible digital citizens.
In the second phase of the partnership for the next three years, selected principals and teachers participated in the Educators Roundtable at the India International Centre, New Delhi in November 2021.
A webinar was also conducted where over 5,000 teachers discussed digital wellbeing, digital citizenship and immersive STEM education using AR/VR in December, 2021.
According to the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020, Meta and CBSE will collaborate on content curation and development of curriculum integrating immersive technologies, Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) that is relevant for the evolving digital landscape by introducing these as skills subjects for students. By integrating Augmented Reality experiences into the curriculum, students will be able to collaborate more actively and create using emerging technologies of the future.
“As a company that is passionate and excited about India’s digital journey, it is our endeavour to provide both educators and students with easy access to quality digital tools to foster a more inclusive and equitable environment. We are united with CBSE in their goal to democratize education for all. We believe access to quality online education resources and new technologies in the form of AR to the country's youth can be transformational to their learning journey,” said Ajit Mohan, vice-president and managing director, Facebook India.
CBSE will aim to empower students in the underserved regions of India through its community skill centers making these new age skills available to the youth and help them become creators in the digital economy through equitable access to resources.
According to Biswajit Saha, director (Skills Education and Training), CBSE, the pandemic has impacted lives all around. “The learning process has undergone an unforeseen shift. This drastic change has brought along a wall of challenges in facilitating the process of learning. With the assistance of Meta, we hope to build on our online teaching and curriculum capabilities and make them available to students across the country. The response to the first phase of the programme was encouraging and has encouraged us to expand the scope of this partnership. This partnership will help equip our teachers with requisite skills to effectively use online tools for student engagement. Understanding that the era of ‘Digital India’ has begun, we aim to build responsible digital citizens with the introduction of Digital Citizenship and Augmented Reality in the curriculum, along with providing quality educational content for all,” he added.
Last updated on 20 Dec 2021
