SMH! Those bloody money-grabbing esports degrees!

Have a day off and give your head a wobble, pal.

When I decided that the first post on my shiny new SubStack would be around universities and education, I definitely overlooked just how ‘complex’ an issue it really is and just how many facets there are to education as an overall topic.

For this particular post, I’ll focus on esports degrees (mainly excl US) given the recent hubbub and chatter around the University of Sunderland launching a BSc (Hons) Esports Event Management degree.

Esports Insider has collated a comprehensive list here.

Image Credit: Unsplash

As tiresome as it may sound, education around esports is still not at the level it should be. In business, esports is still sold (fairly easily) as the ‘only way’ to target that elusive millennial audience who don’t watch the tele with Mum and Dad anymore. Lazy delivery, unimaginative product past the word ‘esports’ and absence of cohesive strategy often lead to campaigns falling perilously short of KPIs that should be achievable – and the spiral continues. But that’s a whole 15 separate blog posts in itself. Vertical education without snobbish arrogance is extremely important.

The reason why I state (mainly excl US) is that I don’t personally have a deep enough understanding of the collegiate system. The entire US traditional sports system is dominated by franchise leagues. The structure to become an NFL player, and the competitive ecosystem for sports (and now esports) seems far better established than in the UK and Europe.

Before I dive in with some thoughts, I’ll make clear that I have done some small teaching sessions at both Staffordshire (London) and ISDE (Masters, Barcelona) around the topics of esports media, and the intersection of gambling and esports. I wouldn’t claim I am a professor in either, but at least have experience and hope I passed on a few pearls to students in the few sessions I helped with.

Degree or not to degree, that is the question?

I have a BSc in Economics from the University of Birmingham and was lucky enough to be in one of the final years where degree education costed but a mere £3,300 per annum compared to the now £9,900 per year before any additional loans, support and living cost.

The financial burden of a degree is substantial, but the structure of a student loan is different (and instead of explaining why, I’ll link to Martin Lewis who does it better). It’s there to encourage and try to allow anyone from any path to enter higher education and put themselves on a ‘level playing field’.

There’s simply not a level playing field in the UK. I recognise my parents relentless nagging and pushing me to study, home-tutoring for the Herts entrance exams had a massive impact on my ‘education journey’. My secondary school’s incessant push on going to university and its importance for future career prospects made it seem as if it was the only choice.

I am the first to recognise that this is far from what everyone experiences, and higher education can seem unobtainable. I do not deny the privilege I have been afforded, but there’s plenty out there in this industry that have been born 3-0 up and still claim they’ve scored a hattrick.

I would encourage anyone and everyone to go to university if it’s what they want to do. Pick a course you find interesting, leave home and experience it. For me, the experience of University, the soft skills you learn and people you meet are every bit as important as that average dissertation I wrote on the statistical determinants of spectator attendance in lower league football, or multiple modules on European Union Economics (now talk about useless modules…).

The outrage of an esports degree

I have, in the past, criticised esports degrees as pointless and a grab for money before carefully reconsidering my position. It’s an easy opinion to hold, but I would encourage everyone to take a step back and have a better look at what they are, who they attract, and what they aim to achieve.

Having been much more on the periphery of the industry over recent years, it’s very easy to see the obscene amount of gatekeeping that still goes on – and the opinion that students that attend Staffordshire, or Sunderland to study a degree in esports will leave with no skills that are of any use is an opinion that is just wrong.

Why do students choose esports degrees?

I chose an economics degree because ‘I’ll just go into finance afterwards, I don’t really have an educational passion and don’t really care about enjoying what I’m studying’. There were not many of us among my friends (the night out, breeze through and get a 2:1 brigade) that had a burning passion for economics and it would rarely be a topic of discussion even in a lecture never mind outside of it.

Students that I have met at Staffs and ISDE ‘live and breathe’ esports, which for the gatekeepers of the industry that are vehemently against institutions offering these courses, is ironically what they advocate and preach.

The grade requirement for an esports degree are not the triple A that an Oxbridge degree may need, or a top engineering degree may need, but offer accessibility for students that are not from academic privilege and want to learn and immerse themselves in an industry they are passionate about. Many students you speak to would have not gone to university were it not for the esports degree, and I would always personally encourage higher education.

One thing you can guarantee is that the students studying esports will have common interests. You’ll have that edgy kid who thinks Super Smash is the number one esport, and the cohort who correctly prefer Dota to League of Legends – but there is commonality there that creates conversation, and debate around the topics taught.

But the modules are awful, they won’t learn anything of use!

Go and visit the campus’ where these courses are taught. They have top-tier studio setups and all have event management components (whether labelled it or not) plus production facets. If these students didn’t go and study esports at university they’d probably be sat at home scrambling for ways to get involved in an industry which still has many closed doors.

And that’s what the degree does – it opens doors. Esports Insider, NUEL, NSE and many other places have close relationships with these institutions. They partner and offer unique opportunity and access to those in the industry – and through guest lectures (and so on), different chances to learn, meet and network that would otherwise be unavailable.

‘Do a proper degree then go into esports’

If you’re going to study esports with the dream of becoming an accountant then I wholly concur with the above statement. If you’re looking for a role in the industry, want to learn more about how it works and equip yourselves properly then an esports degree is simply just not that bad.

If I was looking for an events assistant, and had an application from someone with an Esports degree or a Philosophy degree I’d probably pick the former given their exposure to studio equipment and thus leg-up in experience.

Similarly, if you want someone committed to a role as ‘Team Manager’ and you have to choose an Esports degree vs a Mechanical Engineering degree, one implies passion and desire to work in the industry for the long-term, one perhaps implies a stop-gap or potential hop back over to a different profession. This is purposely a sweeping over-generalisation.

Doing a degree in esports, being positive and maximising the opportunities presented to you is infinitely better than being miserable, doing a degree in Sociology where your university may not even have an esports society and then praying you’ll land your dream job in the esports industry.

Transferable skills

All of the above feeds into ‘transferable skills’. The reason to advocate doing a different degree and then going into esports is that skills from another degree are, as it says on the tin, transferable.

In the same breath, your Business Development Manager at B3$T 3Sports Org Limited will tell you that esports is a completely unique industry. The same people that told you execs from the sports space ‘had no place’ in the industry.

Funnily enough, and to a degree playing devils advocate, learning broadcast from a streaming perspective given the continued pivot from anaologue and digital OTT broadcast methods in an esports degree could actually provide those crucial ‘transferable skills’ that these students would quite obviously get from their…. Psychology of Fashion degree.

It’s tongue-in-cheek, but the point resonates. They’re not going to uni and playing Fortnite for 12 hours a day while shelling £9.9k for the honour of doing so.

If you truly believe that, then once again I’d encourage you to tilt your head to the left, then to the right in a repeated fashion and give it a good aul’ wobble.

Success stories

There are numerous graduates already who have secured jobs in the industry who may not have otherwise. For others, they have higher education under their belt and may have decided that esports is not for them in the end. I won’t name names as I don’t wish to drag anyone into a debate or argument that doesn’t wish to be included.

Having a degree in esports will not shut any doors for you that would have been open otherwise. If it does, they’re not employers worth working for.

Overall, TL;DR – stop hating, encourage and support

Staffordshire and Sunderland are both investing in studios and top-tier environments for their students to learn. It’s not sitting in an old classroom with a sh*t projector looking at handwritten notes from some random bloke.

The way student loan funding works in the UK means this isn’t a life-ruining nefarious money grab, but instead an opportunity for those who may never have considered higher education to dive into something they love. They can come out the other side with a cracking set of skills, broad esports network and solid foundation insight into the way business is done, broadcasts are run and the structure of the overall industry.

Saying a degree is a huge waste of time does nothing but belittle those enrolled, who are often the most passionate people you’ll find.

You don’t have to become a brand ambassador, but there’s little to gain from hating on it, is there?

Let’s take a little trundle away from that gate we keep so tightly and let a few young enthusiastic talents in. Go on, I dare ya.

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