Number of Colleges Offering Degrees in Online Worlds Skyrockets

          Students can build their own classrooms

Pixels and Policy has one more sign that virtual worlds and the development of online environments are more than just passing fads.

An article published in today's Kansas City Star points out that over 250 colleges have added degree programs in online gaming and virtual worlds, with specialties ranging from content creation to graphic design and persistent world programming.

The Star also reports that colleges investing heavily in virtual world technology are already reaping the enrollment dividends. Read on to find out why it's a good time to be a nerd.

Building Virtual Literacy in Real Classrooms

From the Kansas City Star:

This year, 254 of the nation’s colleges and universities in 37 states have such programs, up 27 percent over the year before...According to the Entertainment Software Association, which monitors the game industry, video-game design is the fastest-growing industry in this country.

Colleges around the country are turning generic computer science and programming courses into studies in applied science. Instead of learning how to script or design from a textbook, professors are taking their students in-world across a variety of virtual worlds to practice their skills on real objects.

These courses aren't just for kicks - as the article notes the skills required of successful designers and content/world creators have applications outside mere play. From educational simulations to military war games, video-game design is booming while other sectors of the economy continue to contract. 

Computer design and programming skills are in demand, and universities that respond to what new students are interested in studying will see their enrollments and prestige rise accordingly. This is the new Techno Ivy League exemplified by such forward-thinking schools as South Dakota State University and St. Paul College in Minnesota.

Promote Virtual Courses, Receive Benefits

What's most interesting, though, is how schools that proved to be early-adopters and heavy investors in virtual world programs are rapidly seeing dividends from programs once questioned by university faculty.

We wrote about UC Irvine's $100,000 grant to study virtual worlds and their establishment of a massive virtual worlds study center. Now the Kansas City Star reports that UC Irvine is among an elite group of schools where the best young designers compete for limited spots.

Take little known Johnson County Community College in Kansas City. Never heard of it? Neither had anyone at Pixels and Policy. But it's producing some of the minds behind the next generation of online games:

JCCC began drafting its two-year associate’s degree programs in game development and animation in 2006 because that’s what students wanted. The school had four to six classes that dealt with game programming.

At the time, Fleming and a colleague, Jeff Byers, who teaches animation, were adjunct professors. Now they run the degree programs, which have three other instructors teaching 63 classes for the 64-credit-hour game-developing degree and 47 classes for the 66-credit-hour animation degree.

Virtual degree programs may still be in the early stages of implementation across academia, but with current rates of growth and the Obama Administration warning that a full economic recovery is still years away, can students afford not to understand virtual worlds?

Comments

[Doubledown Tandino]

Who are these professors?
It seems that universities are now capitalizing. There's no professor that has already graduated with a degree in Second Life, so what makes them qualified to be an accredited teacher? It just seems to me that colleges want the money from students willing to pay it.
And what does college credits in Second Life get you? A job in Second Life?

Excellent post though none-the-less. Just pointing out my opinion as an aside. colleges are jumping on the bandwagon for money it seems like. Having a degree in Second Life is like having a degree in Philosophy.

[Emma Robert]

This is very interesting information and i liked the post.