At Unity, we know that the future of the game industry, the future of VR/AR, and, therefore, our own future lies with the young minds in school today who are destined to become the creators of tomorrow.

But the knowledge and skills developed through learning to create games and interactive content doesn’t only benefit aspiring game or VR developers — it is also an excellent way to teach digital literacy and valuable STEM skills to students who might find the process of learning those subjects otherwise uninspiring. Game creation as a vehicle for learning not only motivates those who intend to pursue a career in the industry, but all students who must learn the digital skills — such as art, design, and programming — that are becoming increasingly more relevant and key to employability.

Removing barriers with the Unity License Grant Program

In March of 2015, Unity launched the Unity License Grant Program with a mission to offer free Unity Education software licenses to primary and secondary academic institutions across the globe. By granting Unity licenses at no charge, we hoped to help educators deliver important academic material like physics, math and programming logic in an engaging, multi-disciplinary, team-based, project learning environment, and provide access to the tools that can unlock students’ future success on a wide scale. Since launching the program, we’re thrilled to say we’ve granted nearly 77k licenses worldwide, putting Unity in the hands of over 300k students.

But, we didn’t want to stop there — we wanted to enable even more educators to bring Unity into their classrooms and teach valuable skills that would help set their students up for success by providing free access to the most widely-used game development platform in the world. We aim to reduce barriers to entry to an increasingly in-demand skill set and to help catalyze a lifelong journey of supported learning for individuals, beginning with the development of valuable workforce skills, followed by the validation of competencies through examination, and continuing with ongoing professional development over the course of their career.

Free Unity Education software licenses — now for all levels of edu!

This week, in conjunction with Unite LA 2016, the Unity Education team is delighted to announce that we are expanding the Unity License Grant program to ALL LEVELS of education, which now includes post-secondary institutions such as colleges and universities.

That means any qualifying academic institution or educational program can apply to receive free Unity licenses in support of in-class instruction.These licenses are fully-featured and specifically configured for academic institutions, in order to be easily deployable and manageable in a multi-seat environment. They may be used in support of learning, teaching, training, and research and development activities that are part of the instructional functions performed by the institution and include publishing restrictions.*

Apply for free Unity Education software licenses online today

Educators are welcome to apply on behalf of their institution, simply visit unity3d.com/freeforedu and provide some basic information about your school or program.

*To learn more about Unity licenses for publishing, please contact us.