Bing announced today that later this year it will be starting a new program called Bing for Schools. Under this program, schools in the U.S. will be able to tailor the experience for K-12 students as Bing will offer them ad free results. The search results will also employ always-on SafeSearch, which would ensure that adult content is not returned in search results. There will be a few educational touches as well, Microsoft says that more details about this program will be released in the near future.
Specialized learning features to teach the students about digital literacy will be added to the Bing homepage, which already includes “hotspots” that encourage users to explore new and unexpected topics. Microsoft hasn’t given a precise date of when the Bing for Schools program will go live, it only says that new information regarding the program will be released as they work towards the launch later this year. Only recently the company also announced that the Surface RT tablet will be provided at a substantially discounted price to schools. We’ll share more information regarding the program when it comes in.