Gaming

Washington Students Learn Computer Science Through Game Development

• By Joshua Bolkan
• 05/21/15

A half-dozen students in Washington are learning computer science skills at the local headquarters of a game developer.

The six students, from five high schools and two districts, are learning game design and programming at GG Interactive, where they will spend 80 hours racking up credits toward graduation. Using GG Interactive's Dev Pro game development curriculum, the internship program is modeled on the focus group testing game developers navigate as they prepare to release a new game.

"It doesn't seem like that long ago since I was in high school, but a lot has changed," said Geoff Beckstrom, program manager at GG Interactive, in a prepared statement. "We need the input and feedback directly from today’s students."

The program is part of a larger education initiative for the company, which has 45,000 students registered to take its free game development course over the next year. The curriculum itself was born when the company assisted the state of Nevada in a game curriculum initiative.

"This started as a community project," said Eric Preisz, CEO of GG Interactive, in a news release. "We were asked to provide industry oversight and to be subject matter experts on the topic of game development and computer science. After we finished the framework, we realized there was a bigger need."

More information about Dev Pro is available at gginteractive.com.