[game_edu] Education Membership and Chapters?

[David Finkel]

Several people have written to say that they don't see the need for
education chapters, and wouldn't want to interfere with present general IGDA
chapters or current arrangements for working with colleagues at other
schools.

 

Perhaps it depends where you're located.  I teach at WPI, about 40 miles
west of Boston.  Last year Susan invited a bunch of game educators from the
Boston area to a meeting at Harvard to discuss common interests.  There were
about 25 people there, from at least a dozen schools, from Boston and
Cambridge (of course) but also from Western Mass, New Hampshire and Rhode
Island.  There were lots of people there I had never met before.  We spent
most of the meeting introducing ourselves and telling a bit about the
programs we teach in.

 

The meeting was extremely valuable.  I've learned about programs I've since
visited, and I met people I've started working with.  We've also had some
exploratory talks with other schools about joint programs.

 

At the meeting we all agreed that we should meet regularly, but we haven't
met since.  I think we need some sort of formal organization to keep the
meetings going -- some group that's responsible for arranging the meetings,
setting an agenda, etc.  I suppose this could just be some ad hoc local
group, but it would have greater recognition and continuity if the group
were affiliated with the IGDA.

 

Boston also has a regular IGDA chapter, the Boston Post Mortem.  It meets
monthly, and students and faculty are welcome to attend.  I don't see an
education chapter as supplanting the Post Mortem, or even replacing it in
the schedules of those faculty members who attend.  It's just that the Post
Mortem isn't the place for detailed discussion of classroom techniques,
curriculum proposals, and evaluations of the latest textbooks.  I wouldn't
want the Post Mortem to focus on these issues - I go to the Post Mortem to
hear from developers about the issues in the industry.  Education topics
certainly come up at the Post Mortem, but it's not the focus of the
organization.

 

So perhaps a prerequisite for having a chapter is being located somewhere
that there are a lot of schools with Game programs.  If we had an Ed
Chapter, game educators would certainly want to stay involved with game
development professionals in their area, either through a local IGDA chapter
or informally.  But an Ed Chapter would allow educators to make contacts
with people at other schools and to talk to each other about education
topics.

 

I've already told Susan that I would be willing to help organize a
Boston-area education chapter.

 

David

 

David Finkel                              Telephone: (508) 831-5416

Department of Computer Science            Fax:       (508) 831-5776

Worcester Polytechnic Institute           E-mail:
<mailto:dfinkel at wpi.edu> dfinkel at wpi.edu

Worcester, MA 01609              WWW:  <http://www.cs.wpi.edu/~dfinkel>
http://www.cs.wpi.edu/~dfinkel

 

From: game_edu-bounces at igda.org [mailto:game_edu-bounces at igda.org] On Behalf
Of S. Gold
Sent: Tuesday, April 08, 2008 11:33 AM
To: IGDA Game Education Listserv
Cc: Jason Della Rocca
Subject: [game_edu] Education Membership and Chapters?

 

So I have been giving a lot of thought to an idea I had at GDC and wanted to
get some feedback from the list to get their thoughts. This is very rough,
but hope that I might be able to get some useful feedback to improve upon
what it is we do. I must stress that this is just a feeler type of posting,
not an action item.

As we are all far flung from coast to coast, continent to continent, it is
rare, if ever we meet. When I went to Boston last year I found that there
were over 90 educators working in games in one area or another - all in the
same metro area. Now that is a lot of folks who have common interests.
However there was a lack of network and rarely if ever did they know one
another. The IGDA has chapters in some cities and even in those cities, not
all necessarily cater to the needs of educators or even allow students. Now
some schools have student chapters, however, those have no official ties to
our SIG although we try to provide them with information. My thought, what
if we create some sort of IGDA Education Chapter in areas that have more
than one school? A way to unify, if not help to create more bridges of
opportunity. I have no real formal suggestion for how to set these up. I
also don't know if this is something that we as a group want to do. I guess
I am throwing it out there to see if:

1.	there is a need 
2.	how it would differ from an actual IGDA chapter 
3.	what you want from having an actual education chapter 
4.	where are some of the areas that would benefit from creating a
chapter (such as Boston or London or Sydney that have so many institutions
in one metro area)


My other question, again, just an informal query. Would there be any benefit
to creating Institutional Level Memberships. That is the institution would
get the membership for all faculty, possibly students, etc... for a certain
price. Very similar to the studio memberships they currently offer
(http://www.igda.org/studios/affiliation.php). Of course, I then have to
argue for the benefits of IGDA membership as an individual, since not all
listserv members are currently members (plug to please join). As I see great
value in being part of a professional organization. I am a true believer in
the idea of community which is what I believe the individual cost of $48 USD
is really about, supporting that network and infastructure, the listserv and
forums, promoting games as good not evil, etc... However, would an
institutional membership bennefit our universitites and colleges? Would they
actually pay for them? Would this help solidfy and unify? It would
definitely show our students how professionals act as a community and that
is of great value. The IGDA is currently thinking of new ways to increase
membership, creating different levels of access, I don't want educators
finding that they are left out. Do you have any thoughts?

Looking forward to the discussion,

Susan


-- 
Susan Gold
goldfile at gmail.com

"In a completely sane world, madness is the only freedom!" - J. G. Ballard

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