How Indian EdTech Platform Bets Big on Classrooms in Metaverse- Technology News, Firstpost

Mehul Ruben Das04 Oct 2022 18:21:38 IST

For many people in India, words like blockchain and meta-universe are buzzwords that are hardly used, at least in India. Ask anyone who works with the EdTech industry, however, and you’ll understand why many industry insiders are willing to bet big on EdTech platforms despite stiff competition and a few unicorns whose valuations are falling.

The introduction of 5G networks and 5G services is expected to accelerate development in a number of industries, such as healthcare, logistics, agriculture and insurance. But one sector where industry experts are slightly more optimistic than others is education.

EdTech platforms have indeed changed the attitude of Indian parents towards education. Whether this was for better or worse is up for debate. The next big revolution in the education sector will come in the form of a rather unlikely technology — the metaverse.

“Metaverse will bring about a major paradigm shift in the way we see education in India,” says Yuvraj Krishan Sharma, CTO, CEO and co-founder of Edverse, an EdTech platform that has the first Metaverse classroom in the country.

“We will not only eliminate the geographical limitations that exist in current education in our country, but also eliminate economic barriers. With Metaverse, we can provide a fully decentralized and democratic platform for students in India to learn and teachers from around the world to learn.”

Metaverse isn’t the only technology that institutions like Edverse are applying to learning and teaching. EdTech platforms are increasingly providing learning modules and educational content that use 3D resources and virtual or augmented reality. Edverse, which recently raised $700,000 in its seed round, already has the nation’s largest library repository of 3D and 2D assets, AR/VR modules.

“One of the biggest obstacles in education today is the nature of the content and how it’s delivered,” says Sharma. “The content that most teachers have at their disposal is static and passive. Not all students respond to this, learning should be exciting and engaging, it should be something students can interact with and play with. The level of content should grow exponentially in the coming years. So gamification becomes important. Learning has become much more experiential and application-based.”

While learning may have become more application-oriented and experience-based, assessments, especially in schools and even many institutions, are theoretical. Essentially, while experiential and application-based education can help students truly learn, grading is a whole different ball game. So how do parents and, more importantly, schools respond?

Was one of the first schools to have a class in Metaverse Edverse Holy Soldier Divine Public School, Panchkula. “The school was already aware of what a virtual world was and what it could do and the potential of the idea, so convincing them to get on board was not a big problem,” says Sharma.

As for the children’s parents, Sharma believes they have had an epiphany over the past couple of years. “Today, parents have realized that grades are not so important, the main thing is whether their children get an education, whether they really learn something. They realized that the current education system cannot guarantee that their children will have the necessary skill sets in 15 years. The important thing is that they have to be early adopters of technology, only then will they remain relevant,” he says.

One of the problems with more sophisticated technologies entering the education system is that most educators and teachers do not necessarily have the technical know-how to use these technologies to their full potential. Teachers need to be trained for the Metaverse, admits Sharma.

But EdTech platforms should also make it easy for them. “Of course there is a generation gap, but the way to counter that is to make the user interface or user interface and the UX or user experience as simple as possible. We start with something as simple as using a browser-based application. Only then will we be able to make education truly decentralized.”