"...a dedicated education track to upskill new esports aficionados is an important sign of growing maturity for the industry as a whole. "
Viktor Erlandsson
Despite the surge in popularity that it has enjoyed during the last decade, esports still has difficulty dispelling the skepticism and negative stereotypes that commonly surround all “young” industries. To most, esports is still seen as a niche interest, sitting at a crossroads between video games, sport, and entertainment. It is exactly this intersection that gives esports its own distinct identity, drawing in talent and skills found in these other sectors. We can see the results of this mix of disciplines clearly in how esports is filtering into the halls of higher education.
With the growth of esports as an industry comes the increased need for more esports competitors across a whole range of games. That demand creates the need for a pipeline, which starts from grassroots and reaches up to the highest level of competition. Given the levels of success enjoyed by top level players and streamers, this has proven to be an incredibly popular career path for a huge number of young people. While not everyone is likely to reach the dizzy heights of professional esports (just as not everyone is likely to become a star athlete), in parallel with traditional sports scholarships, more and more courses are sprouting up which are focused on teaching the skills needed to advance as players.
Contrary to some beliefs, these courses don’t mean that students will spend three years playing games. Instead their usefulness comes from taking a holistic approach to esports both as a sport, and as an emerging industry. New career paths are being established in esports that require a range of different skills within an esports education framework. Careers like how to become a referee, a coach, broadcast engineer, a content creator or an event manager are all crucial to the wider industry. And there also are opportunities in marketing, sales, web development and design.
While many roles in the industry are currently held by people who were involved in esports before its explosion in popularity, as the esports industry continues to evolve, more and more courses have appeared that are specifically tailored to it as a distinct education path and business sector. In the US, Virginia's Shenandoah University, Becker College in Massachusetts and The Ohio State University all offer esports specific degrees. In the UK, the University of Warwick just announced that it is to invest £275,000 in a new esports centre after it was crowned the “UK Esports University of the Year”.
The main problem and most persistent criticism of esports in higher education is around the quality of education that these courses provide. This certainly varies from course to course, with the gap between the best and the worst wider than in other spaces simply because esports is still a young industry. Esports as a whole still needs to find the best ways to use its existing talent to teach future generations, in order to create the same standard of teaching that is expected from more established areas of learning.
While the idea of esports degrees in higher education may be in its infancy, the high demand for new talent of all types in the esports space means that continued investment in esports education is set to continue apace. It may be a significant departure from the ecosystem of yesteryear - where an interest in games and knowing the right person could land you a job - but a dedicated education track to upskill new esports aficionados is an important sign of growing maturity for the industry as a whole.
But it is important that we do not lose sight of the core lessons that less “official” esports initiatives provide. Just as with sports, the benefits of esports go far beyond the surface level skills required to do well. They teach the same core principle of teamwork - you can only win as a team that is coordinated, and can’t exclusively rely on individual talent or skill. A lesson that remains valuable no matter where students end up working.
The world of work is changing, with technology opening up new career paths that would have been unimaginable to people even a generation or two before. Esports and all the many roles within it are a perfect example of that. Just like any new sector trying to establish itself, there will be doubt from people who don’t understand it, and there will be growing pains. But its growth presents an opportunity for people to find their dream jobs within it, and creating a path to those jobs through education is something that should be encouraged both by the industry and educators alike.
