This originally started for gaming purposes, but now it’s going viral in Education and Training sector as well as per Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World to Ernest Cline’s VR paradigm as described in Ready Player One.
Over the last several years, VR has moved from being the purview of the military and aviation to the mainstream of professional development, as managers, instructors, coaches and therapists have claimed increasing benefit from immersive experiences. There is no data on how it’s being used in Education, but the companies like zSpace, Alchemy VRand Immersive VR Education are providing schools with packaged educational curriculum and content, teacher training and technological tools to support VR-based instruction in the classroom. A biology lesson at a school in the Czech Republic that employed a Leap Motion controller and specially adapted Oculus Rift DK2 headsets, stands as an exemplary model of innovative scientific learning.
In what may turn out to be an immersive education game changer, Google launched its Pioneer Expeditions in September 2015. Under this program, thousands of schools around the world are getting — for one day — a kit containing everything a teacher needs to take their class on a virtual trip: Asus smartphones, a tablet for the teacher to direct the tour, a router that allows Expeditions to run without an Internet connection, a library of 100+ virtual trips (from the Great Wall of China to Mars) and Google Cardboard viewers or Mattel ViewMasters that turn smartphones into VR headsets. It cost them $542M.
The virtual fire continues to heat up beneath the AR/VR industry with investments continuing to build and soar. According to a report from Digi-Capital, AR and VR investments are taking off pretty rapidly with nearly $700 million being invested into the space in 2015. As per the data gathered by Digi-Capital, around $2 million were invested in AR and VR projects by June 2017.
But how much is being invested in Education is still to be determine.
Working for vaccines producing company, it’s an increasing interest for me to launch a pilot VR project using 360 Camera and couple of headsets and cellphones. I think with investment less than $1,000 will provide an ever-expanding immersive landscape to our employees, where they can engage with managers/trainer and each other in transformative experiences through a wide spectrum of interactive resources. I personally feel, VR has a definitive place of value.
