University of the West of England gains TIGA Accreditation

By March 4, 2015 Press Releases

TIGA, the network for game developers and digital publishers, and trade association representing the UK videogame industry, has announced that the University of the West of England (UWE) is the latest university to gain TIGA Accreditation, for its BSc (Hons) Games Technology course.

A thorough review was carried out both on and off site by TIGA’s Accreditation Committee which includes Chris Kingsley, CTO and Co-Founder, Rebellion, Professor Carsten Maple of the University of Warwick, Dr Mark Eyles of the University of Portsmouth and Dr Mike Reddy of the University of South Wales.

The Accreditation Committee found UWE’s course to be delivering a range of skills at an appropriate depth and breadth for the games industry, with a number of exceptional areas of good practice. For example:

  • UWE’s in-house PlayWest development studio affords students valuable opportunities to work in an industry environment on commercial projects;
  • the integration of core computing skills in game related modules enables students to better understand the game applications of what they are learning;
  • the number of game specific modules on the course, rather than more generic shared modules, has resulted in a focused, rich and relevant student experience, and;
  • the course team actively supports the development of a regional enterprise cluster, ensuring the continuing and future value of the course to the local region.

The course works particularly well with local game developers and related industries, responding as necessary to the skill demands of these local developers. UWE’s PlayWest Conference also gives students valuable opportunities to network with these developers and showcase their work as well as hearing the experiences of course alumni.

35 per cent of UWE’s BSc (Hons) Games Technology students are getting jobs either directly in the games or closely related industries, which compares well to the reported industry average of 12 per cent (Next Gen. report 2011). Additionally, 83 per cent of students are securing jobs in wider industries as a direct result of the graduate skills they gained on the course.

Following the accreditation process, TIGA also provides a number of key recommendations regarding how accredited universities and colleges can improve the quality of the course even further.

Carina Mclane, Programme Leader – BSc Games Technology, UWE, said:

“We are very pleased to join the growing ranks of TIGA Accredited Games courses. The Games team at UWE has dedicated the past decade to align our course to industry requirements and it is incredibly rewarding to see areas of our practice that we have pushed particularly hard for cited as areas of particularly good practice. We embrace the recommendations made by the accrediting panel which align with our intentions to extend our dedicated console development practice to further enhance our provision.”

Dr Richard Wilson, CEO, TIGA, comments:

“Congratulations to UWE for becoming the latest of our educational members to gain TIGA accreditation. Games developers compete to a critical extent on the quality of their teams. TIGA has introduced the TIGA Accreditation process to ensure that universities and colleges can produce graduates with industry relevant skills. The TIGA Accreditation system accredits the best undergraduate and postgraduate university courses enabling both prospective students and game developers to identify those courses that are producing industry ready graduates.”

Dr Mark Eyles, University of Portsmouth, added:

“Having another fine course accredited by the industry is great news. Identifying the best game development focussed courses in the UK is valuable to both industry and to future students who are searching for a course that delivers the learning experience that they will need to seek work in the games industry, or even set up their own games companies. The students at UWE are developing a rich mix of skills to prepare them for working with game development technologies.”

 

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Notes to editors:

Key features of the TIGA Accreditation process:

  • All TIGA Accredited courses teach skills required by the games industry. These skills are also becoming increasingly in demand in other related industries such as the synthetic training industry.
  • Courses are examined by a panel of industry and academic experts to ensure that students are developing games industry skills as well as transferable skills (communication, team working, problem solving and so on) important to the games industry and at an appropriate level.
  • As an important part of the accreditation process courses provide details of the percentage of their graduates finding work in the games industry and also in related industries.
  • Each course is judged on its own merits and must demonstrate that it works closely with the games industry to stay up to date and relevant. By judging courses in this way TIGA Accreditation is suitable for a wide range of games courses, including those with a programming, art, design or business/entrepreneurial focus.
  • Universities are also required to show that they have the resources (hardware, software, staff, labs and so on), curriculum, syllabi, quality systems and student support to deliver their courses.
  • One of the key strengths of TIGA accreditation is that it is not confined to only ‘technical’ or ‘art’ courses, but also covers other game development skills (such as game design, mobile game development, indie development entrepreneurship).
  • Additionally it is able to keep up to date with the latest developments in game technologies and does not have prescribed lists of skills, which can become limiting in the extremely fast moving games industry. For a course to be accredited the university must have identified specific game developer skill needs and developed their course to meet these.
  • Accreditation lasts for 5 years at which time courses are re-examined to ensure they are maintaining their standards. If successful they are re-accredited. Courses must also submit a yearly report to the TIGA Accreditation Committee.
  • Accreditation is open to all TIGA education members. TIGA Accredited courses are supported through TIGA’s educational initiatives and have assistance in remaining abreast of current industry practices. TIGA Accreditation is focused on campus based university and college courses.

The TIGA Accreditation process has been in development since January 2010, with a number of models being explored before settling on the simple, robust and rigorous process of requiring courses to demonstrate that they are producing students who have developed skills that are in demand by game developers, while allowing courses the freedom to address a wide range of industry needs.

A first set of six courses, from the University of Portsmouth, Sheffield Hallam University and Bournemouth University, have already been accredited, the UWE course is the seventh. A further fifteen courses are at the start of the TIGA Accreditation process.

For more information on TIGA Accreditation, please contact: Dr Mark Eyles, University of Portsmouth: mark.eyles@port.ac.uk.

About TIGA

TIGA is 90% funded by independent UK businesses. 80% of our board members are developers and/or from UK owned businesses, and 50% of our board are UK business owners themselves. Since 2010, TIGA has won 17 business awards. TIGA focuses on three sets of activities:

  • Political representation
  • Media representation
  • Business services

This enhances the competitiveness of our members by providing benefits that make a material difference to their businesses, including a reduction in costs and improved commercial opportunities. It also means our members’ voices are heard in the corridors of power and positively represented in national, broadcast and UK video game trade media.

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