Hi
I felt it was time to remind everyone that there is education outside of universities and schools. Namely colleges yes, we are here, we exist and hey we even teach courses in games development.
OK I’m being a bit flippant there, but I want to remind everyone that there are other options when you leave school or are thinking of a career change. I also want to shout out to industry that we exist, and we do produce graduates that overall do go on to university to continue and get their honours degree before entering the workforce.
Why am I even mentioning this? Well, it’s become clearer to me over the past couple of years being involved with Scottish Games Week and leading on the Education Symposium that I’ve heard a lot of talks from industry (and seen other events run) that people just point blank don’t mention college level education. As a college lecturer attending such talks its so disheartening to hear people who do give great talks but then talk about university students and that’s it. I want people to recognise that colleges also play a part in the games industry, and we work hard to ensure the best for our students to enable them to head off to university for the last 2 years of their degree and gain employment.
For me this is why I set up Scottish Games Education Network to bring together those who teach games but also with the hope that along with Scottish Games Network there will be a better recognition of how the education landscape flows and it’s not just school then uni but can be school, college then uni or even school, life then college & uni.
My hope is that educators within both colleges and universities will get together and talk about courses and how we can ensure the best for our students while also having the opportunity to have interactions with industry which for the best part really has only been open to university. So far between the network and Scottish Games Week things are moving which is awesome and I want to continue with the momentum but also want everyone to realise we aka college lecturers are there teaching and doing our best to ensure a bright future for our students.
Amanda Ford 
There’s a strong case for raising awareness that colleges offer an educational pathway to a careers in games development (and related areas). Schools in particular, but as you mention, also those considering a career change. I think employers are a harder sell as you mention yourself,
“I also want to shout out to industry that we exist, and we do produce graduates that overall do go on to university to continue and get their honours degree before entering the workforce.“
The point here being that it seems to be a default position that companies are looking for degrees. If there are alternative routes into the industry via an HNC/HND, then it makes sense to highlight these (though I’m not sure what those are to be honest). It could be that employers are not aware of the skills an HND graduate has, so perhaps work needs to be done there? Or if the message is that colleges offer a route to a degree, then that’s fine too.
I wonder what it is that colleges could do to raise their profile in this space. Could we have an ‘Electric Honey‘ for games development?