FSCC gears up for Gaming Greyhounds
Fort Scott Community College is bringing competitive online gaming to campus with ‘eSports’. What is eSports? “eSports describes the world of competitive, organized video gaming. Competitors from different leagues or teams face off in the same games that are popular with at-home gamers: Fortnight, League of Legends, Counter-Strike, Call of Duty, Overwatch and Madden NFL, to name a few. These gamers are watched and followed by millions of fans all over the world, who attend live events or tune in on TV or online. Streaming services like Twitch allow viewers to watch as their favorite gamers play in real time, and this is typically where popular gamers build up their fandoms” (Willingham, A. 2018).
FSCC will be offering the following to students who are interested in becoming a Gaming Greyhound:
- Books and Tuition scholarship for 15 credit hours
- Private gaming area for practicing and competing
- Travel for competitions
- Networking with other gamers, spectators, and possible sponsors
- A coach to lead them to victory
FSCC will be competing in the games League of Legends and Overwatch, with the possibility for more games in the near future.
“We are thrilled to add eSports to our varsity sports programs. This is a multi-billions dollar industry that is growing every single year, and we are very excited to lead the way for two-year colleges in the region. Esports has been one of our most requested activities from prospective students in recent years. We believe this will open the doors to some exciting new partnerships with area sponsors, and we are looking forward to our gaming future” says Tom Havron, V.P. of Students and Athletic Director.
To find out more information or to become a Gaming Greyhound, contact Tom Havron at [email protected] or call 620.223.2700.
For information regarding scholarships, please contact Admissions at [email protected] or call 620.223.2700 ext. 3510.
Reference:
Willingham, A. (2018) “What is eSports? A look at an explosive billion-dollar industry”. Retrieved from https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/27/us/esports-what-is-video-game-professional-league-madden-trnd/index.html.
Are we EDUCATING our YOUTH? seems to me we are entertaining them more than EDUCATING them. This tax payer would withdraw my support if I could.
Seriously. …. ??? Why don’t they add a Suduko and Crossword team as well…be more diverse and inclusive…for older students not as tech savvy. … This ranks right up there with the city hiring a tourism director and the county hiring a economic director. …. Time to clean house at fscc board. As well as city and county.
They are still getting educated. Esports and the gaming industry in general are a multibillion dollar industry. I for one am excited to see this happen
Is sudoku or crosswords a billion dollar industry. And a future business opportunity for those who are tech savvy and like games.
Garret – What are the future career opportunities for people playing video games in college? A brief look at jobs sites shows that there are some jobs posted, but the vast majority of those are jobs in software engineering.
…and a job in software engineering is a growing and excellent career field to be in. Good for FSCC for bringing opportunities to young people who see what the future truly holds.
Software engineering is definitely a good career, but I don’t see anything in the announcement that seems to be targeting software engineering. There are competitive programs for writing code, but that isn’t what is being discussed here. eSport as a path to software engineering would be similar to assuming that football is a good step toward a career as a doctor.
Not a great comparison. Coding is actually a component of eSports. Tackling isn’t a component of medicine.
https://info.jkcp.com/blog/5-things-parents-should-know-about-esports-as-a-career-path
@Alex – So FSCC is going to be teaching software engineering as part of the eSports program? Where did you see that. I don’t see anything that implies they are going to be involved in anything like ICPC. And honestly most students that are getting really serious about programming competition, don’t have time to spend a lot of time “training” to play video games.
The link you sent said that you can still learn to code while playing video games. That is true just like you can learn to code while also playing competitive shuffleboard. I didn’t see anything that says software engineering is a component of every eSports program.
As a 13-year-old web developer here in Fort Scott, I think this is actually not a bad idea like said before, this industry has recently blown up, some esports player is making millions, more than most will ever make. It’s absolutely crazy how much many people can make from this. Tons of esports players also make money off of Broadcasting on sites like twitch.tv, Youtube Gaming, and other broadcasting platforms. Times have changed, we need more technology smart people more and more every day. Being a professional esports player is hard work, yes… you get to play games for a living, but with the thousands of hours you have to put into the game, it can be very very boring, and even torturess.