Exciting Week: Gaming Professionals Visit/Review CAT-South's Program

Reviewing a game created in Visual Studio (no Unity) . Note the code running behind game play.

I am in my second year teaching Gaming and SimGaming and Simulation at CAT South, a Career Training School (CTE) within the Anne Arundel Public School system. Being a professional, I greatly value the annual event (PAC) when industry and academic professionals visit and review the program. On Thursday, they provided insight on what needs to be our focus in education for this fast moving field of Gaming. I am honored that they took their time during a week day to spend a couple of hours meeting with Level 2 students and Administrators.

I want to thank the following for not only coming to PAC but their active participation throughout the year on making this program better: Rick Williams of LAN Line Games; Rob Samson-Krebs of ISO Sprites (both just released TheSandKnight.com); Professor Drew Synder and Elias DuBose of Anne Arundel Community College; and Koral McKenna, Technology Specialists of AACPS.

Also during this busy week, on Tuesday we had a guest speaker, Ben Fawley, a sophomore at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT.edu) review his experience with my students on what it is like to attend one of the top 3 Gaming programs on the East coast. He showcased his game which he and his classmates created in Visual Studio using only code and provided sprites (with no help being provided by a visual interface like Unity). Very impressive work!

Ben Fawley (pictured far right) explaining the coding assignment of the game (shown on screen) that he and his fellow classmates created at RIT.edu

Besides the PAC meeting, Koral McKenna came in early this semester with many robots to help launch the coding unit for our Level 2 class.

Rick Williams of LAN Line Games has been very active with improving the curriculum of our program, especially with Unity. He is an alumni of the AACC Gaming Program under Professor Drew Snyder.

Rob Samson-Krebs of LAN Line Games and ISO Sprites has also been very active with improving the curriculum of our program, especially in Sprites development. He is an alumni of the AACC Gaming Program under Professor Drew Snyder. NOTE the new “Think Tank” area in the classroom. Packed with retro game systems and a library of creative books.

Of course, gaming is not all about coding and screens, we have not lost our love of desktop and board games! Pictured here is the collection of hand-painted Warhammer 40,000 miniatures by CAT South Teaching Assistant, James Turek. On Fridays, we try new stuff that is game related but a break from the curriculum.

What a week it was at CAT South’s Gaming and Simulation! Needless to say, I am having a blast as the Instructor of this impressive program and honored to guide these awesome students!

Joe Barsin, Gaming Instructor at CAT-South, and Ben Fawley of RIT.edu talking shop.