The Games Education Summit returns for 2021 as a virtual event, taking place on Wednesday March 31st and Thursday April 1st.
Speakers, including leaders from Unity, Playground Games, Fabrik Games, Aardvark Swift, AIM Group, Bolton University, Amiqus, BAME in Games, G Into Games, NextGen Skills Academy, Payload Studios, Nord Anglia Education and Sumo Digital, will share innovative solutions for teaching and nurturing talent, as well as providing advice on supporting students from diverse backgrounds into their careers in games.
Running during Games Careers Week, the virtual event will feature collaborative sessions for studios and educators to engage on games industry education and recruitment issues in the middle of the pandemic.
Covid has caused massive upheaval in education while recruiters have faced challenges in hiring and onboarding the finest new talent to maintain the games industry’s headlong growth.
With Brexit and new immigration rules, it’s never been more important for the UK games industry to nurture home-grown future talent.
The Games Education Summit will tackle these key issues – and more – during a two-day event uniquely curated for games studios, educators and recruiters.
Day 1 will focus on best practice, with innovators and leaders in games companies and education sharing how they’ve successfully adapted their programmes to work during the pandemic. On Day 2 students, interns and young developers will deliver valuable insights into their pathways towards careers in games.
Topics and themes covered will include:
- Ready, Player… Learn – The future of learning in a post-Covid world
- Diversity: How games studios and educators are changing the profile of the workforce
- State of the art games recruitment: How studios have worked with educators to identify and hire new talent during the pandemic
- Covid course curation: Further & Higher educators at the cutting edge share their tips and tricks
- Pathways to games in a pandemic: New hires into games studios share how they transitioned into their jobs
- The new Apprenticeships and Internships
- ‘My Student Journey’ – Students feedback on their own experiences
“Education and business have faced the most challenging period in history over the past 10 months,” said Rick Gibson, CEO of the BGI, which hosts the Games Education Summit.
“The games industry has experienced record growth during the pandemic, but it’s not plain sailing. We’re all under pressure from lockdown, hiring from the global talent pool is harder after Brexit and the recruitment and onboarding of new staff has been a challenge for our rapidly growing industry. Education has been significantly affected with further education and universities experiencing huge disruptions from stop/start in-class teaching and the return of home learning for students of all ages. The Games Education Summit brings together influential studios, recruiters and educators to discuss how we nurture the UK’s future games talent.”
Get your tickets to GamesEd21 at Eventbrite.
Notes to Editors
For more information on the Games Education Summit, contact Conor Clarke at conor@thebgi.uk and follow @thebgi on Twitter.
About the BGI
The BGI, charity number 1183530, educates the public about the art, science, history and technology of videogames through the National Videogame Museum, online training and other educational programmes such as Games Careers Week. For more details about the BGI, please visit: http://www.thebgi.uk.