1 A College Game Jam for Secondary Students Mistakes and SuccessesEducating For Careers 2017
2 About Me and the Game JamBegan teaching maths in 2007 as a new teacher Began teaching Game Design in 2014 Currently teaching Game Design Principles, Physics, and AP Computer Science Principles Met Nathan (President of the Video Game Development Club, VGDC, at CSULB) during the IGDA Student SIG at GDC in March of 2016 Agreed a Game Jam would be fun to try and ran with it Melissa Norrbom, Assistant Director Student Life and Development, at CSULB became our go- between and helped coordinate the event.
3 Planning the Game Jam
4 5 Months Out (April) Following our introduction at GDC, we set up a preliminary planning meeting at CSULB for April Myself and one other teacher, Melissa (CSULB), and members from the VGDC all met to determine the scope of our Game Jam Friday, September 23 was the event date Original intent was 150 students; this was very ambitious Game Jam would be digital The VGDC is a student organization, so most or all fees would be waived to use facilities Treat it like an outreach event so CSULB is motivated to support it I reached out to Game Design teachers at other local sites to see if they wanted to participate Bulk of planning left up to Nathan and the VGDC
5 2 Months Out (July) Since school was out for summer, communication began to break down VGDC students not monitoring s as diligently Teachers not monitoring diligently, if at all I met with Melissa at CSULB to check Game Jam progress and evaluate next steps VGDC still needed to file some paperwork; Melissa would notify them
6 1 Month Out (August) Able to contact teachers at other sites and get buy-in, so hoping to meet 150 student quota Other teachers only have 1 month to submit field trip paperwork and secure funding for buses Sent out permission slips to students (why is it so hard to get them back?) The intention of having the event in September is so that it can be treated as a “kick-off” to the new academic year This unfortunately restricted planning time for teachers
7 2 Weeks out (September) Order lunches from the cafeteriaCheck status of venue with VGDC Try getting permission slips from students (seriously, why is this so hard?) The event being on a Friday in September meant we were competing with athletics for buses This prevented some students from other schools from attending Luckily we were able to reduce venue size with minimal hassle
8 Final Numbers Ultimately 40 students attended the event, 20 from my class and 20 from a similar class in Corona-Norco, and adjacent district The length of the trip (8:00 am to 8:00 pm for travel) dissuaded some students from attending Students were mixed into 10 teams of 4 8 VGDC members acted as leads (many were at a job fair and couldn’t attend)
9 Day of the Event
10 Outreach Representative from CSULB opened the event by talking about CSULB in general and the admission requirements followed by a Q&A
11 Brainstorming
12 We brought 20 chrome books so students could program in pairs
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16 Team Leads Taking a break during the day
17 Dinner Stopped at In-N-Out on the way home
18 Example Games
19 Pumpkin Spice InvadersSpace Invaders clone
20 Leafy Basket Leaves increase counter by 1 Bombs decrease counter by 1
21 Autumn cat Endless faller Avoid the obstacles
22 Take-Aways
23 Positives Small group (40) was good for a first time eventPlanned over summer so I had free time as did the contact at CSULB Student led event so most fees waived Excellent learning experience for all stakeholders Were able to keep costs to a minimum Brought chromebooks and used Scratch in browser so no additional software needed
24 Negatives Organized during summer so stakeholders did not view/respond to regularly Failed to establish a regular communication protocol Planning the event was new to the students; paperwork deadlines problematic Teams led by college students with varying degrees of programming expertise and leadership experience. We should have led a training class with them the week prior
25 Negatives Continued Most places on campus closed on Friday; had planned to eat dinner at food court on campus but unable to Chromebooks were 2-1; 1-1 would have been better and prevented idle students No student wanted to eat the bag lunches provided by our cafeteria, ended up giving them away to college students
26 Did it Matter?
27 Computer Science Attitude SurveyI wanted an effective way to measure outcomes from the event Research uncovered the study Measuring high school students’ attitudes toward computing by Daniel Heersink and Barbara Moskal from the Colorado School of Mines Contacted the authors and Ms. Moskal provided me with the survey questions used in the study Gave those same questions to students before and after the event, and after a field trip to a Video Game Developer
28 Constructs Survey consists of 37 questions about attitudes towards computer science from 5 different constructs Confidence (9) Usefulness (6) Professional (3) Gender (9) Interest (10)
29 Disclaimer Some of the students did not take both surveysSample set is small, so any conclusions are guesses at best Students love field trips, but does that translate to improved attitudes?
30 Results Median score increased for all constructs except Interest (fell from 5 to 4.5) Minimum score increased for all constructs except Confidence Maximum score for all constructs increased or stayed the same except for Confidence Overall increase in positive attitudes, but slight drop in Confidence. Why?
31 Wild Speculation Positive events increase positive attitudes, but…..Students realize the level of effort that is required to be successful in the Games Industry, and that correlates to a drop in Confidence about Computer Science
32 Organizing your own event
33 CSU/UC Map Which schools are near you?
34 Which Colleges to Contact (CSU)All CSU schools offer Computer Science as a major CSU Channel Islands offers a Minor in Game Design & Development CSU San Bernardino offers an option in Game Development
35 Which Colleges to Contact (UC)All UC also offer Computer Science UC Irvine: Computer Game Science UC Santa Cruz: Games & Playable Media; Computer Game Design
36 Which Colleges to Contact (Private)USC: Interactive Entertainment; Computer Science (Games); or minors in Game Design, Game Animation, Game Audio, Game Entrepreneurship, Game User Research Cogswell College (San Jose): Game Design and Development Academy of Art University (San Francisco): Game Development (BFA or AA); Game Programming
37 Who to talk to Contact the department directlyPhone is better than In-person better than phone For a list of contact information, click here Only use once contact has been established and they are expecting mail from you, otherwise you are spam
38 Costs Transportation is largest hurdle, schools should pay for this. If no budget money this year, fight hard for it next year. Show you have a plan Box lunches economical but kids do not appreciate them. If you can provide students with $5 and they bring $5, then any fast food lunch is viable If college will let you use a computer lab, awesome! If not use analog games
39 School to School Jams? I have contemplated having high school students go to other high schools for jams If students have own devices and school is willing to try/finance, I would like to see an end of year event where high school students take over a hotel and have a Game Jam Competition Something that has a little more clout like the Skills USA championships
40 My next step
41 USC Game Jam Event at USC in March with 200 studentsLearned to plan event during school year: Contacts more engaged with work so more liable to respond to but also more busy Analog game jam so no need for computers; easier to accommodate large numbers Working with academic department directly rather than student group. More costs, but more expertise Host event on Tuesday so things are open, less conflict with athletics hopefully. District push to schedule field trips to use LCAP funds caused me to have to book an extra bus through a charter service at extra cost
42 Questions?
43 Your next step
44 Advice Determine an event window; be mindful of athletics!!Which college or high school will host the event? Establish a point of contact at the college (this may take some doing) What other schools and/or districts are you working with? Who at the district level can help you? Does your district have dedicated CTE personnel?
45 Sit by Geographic RegionIf you aren’t already, please sit with teachers from your area Meet your compatriots! Plan something! Can you arrange something by June? Use the remaining minutes to plan an event!