This passion can be channeled into learning the real-time skills that are set to transform the job market of the future. “Their e-sports program has been very successful and incorporates talks, information, and education about games as a potential career-not just a pastime.”įurnishing students with real-time skillsįor educators, tapping into the wildly popular cultural phenomenon of gaming offers the prospect to engage youth in a way that is rarely possible. “The whole idea around Carrot is to give kids a prize or goal they are interested in and want to pursue, while also providing them with something that could really benefit them,” he says. It designs collaborative experiences and events to help engage youth around STEAM subjects, with e-sports one of its core programs. “I think programs like this are a nice bridge between the two.”Ĭarrot is an organization that has long recognised this potential. “Statistically, students engaged in e-sports and gaming are more likely to have interest in STEM/STEAM,” he says. Esports are increasingly being recognised as a way to reach students who often are otherwise disengaged from the school community.Įric sees initiatives like his as a way to connect the e-sports popular with teens to learning paths in real-time skills. While some of these kids will be involved in school sports and clubs, many are not. The Pew Research Center has reported that 97% of teen boys and 83% of teen girls play video games.
BOOTCAMP FOR TEENS DRIVER
In the future, I hope we’re able to learn more about scripts.”Įnthusiasm for gaming can be a powerful driver for STEM/STEAM education. “I really enjoyed the whole experience-learning that everything is made from simple shapes,” says Naythen Cortez, a student from Compton Unified School District who participated in the bootcamp. “This is a great first step, and I would love to see them build into a longer program and create their own experiences and games.”įor some of the students, this certainly seems a possibility. “I think exposure is great, but true learning and skill development requires prolonged practice and repetition,” he says. “This is a great assignment to go over all the basic tools of Unreal Engine, gives them something tangible quickly-and is also fun.”Ī stepping stone into interactive 3D careersĮric hopes his bootcamp will be the launchpad for a new journey for the students. “Each student built their own museum space based on reference, then inhabited the space with custom lighting and images that they chose,” he explains. Over the course of the bootcamp, these students would learn their way around Unreal Engine and start to build a solid foundation of real-time skills.Įric needed a project to base the learning experience around, so he took the Build a Virtual Museum lesson plan and gave it a twist. He put together a group of high-school students, ranging in experience and aptitude, from a few different schools in the Compton Unified district. With the Epic MegaGrant in the bag, Eric had the means to organize and design the program, fund an instructor, and get the word out to find the participants. “He’s also from the South LA area, so it was very personal for him to be involved.” “I got super lucky that Bennie was interested and available,” Eric says. “It seemed like a great opportunity to put together an Unreal Bootcamp and test out the new virtual desktop, so I applied for a MegaGrant.”īennie Terry III is a longtime industry veteran who has worked with Hollywood giants including Disney and Marvel. When Eric put the word out for an instructor for the bootcamp, Bennie got in touch. “I had been talking with the Compton Unified School District for sometime about designing a video game pathway,” he says. There, he heard about the roll out of a virtual desktop solution that enables Unreal Engine to run on Google Chromebooks. I’m always looking to see what I can do to balance the scales as much as possible.”Įric found a chance to redress the balance by joining the Epic Secondary Education Advisory Board, a group of secondary teachers that supports the educational community. “At the same time, there’s tremendous talent and interest in games. “I see in the inner city such a disparity in education and opportunities for video games,” he says. Over the course of his career, Eric has discovered a wealth of untapped potential in inner-city areas. Starting out in education teaching animation in Philadelphia, he moved to Los Angeles in 1997 to work in the animation industry. Elder has been in media arts education and production for a little over thirty years.