The global esports industry has doubled to more than $1.5 billion in the past couple of years. And according to Statista, it is expected to grow to nearly $3 billion in 2025. There must be a solid reason why children and grown-ups love video games.
Esports is more than just a hobby. Of course, they provide a dopamine boost with each small victory but, more importantly, give us a lot in return for our time - skills, coordination, mental resilience, social skills, and more.
Schools and the government are realizing how much esports education could bring to children in a controlled environment. For this reason, esport leagues are beginning to be incorporated in different schools across the world.
How do Esport Leagues Improve Education?
Extracurricular activities tend to increase the likelihood of children wanting to go back to school the next day in anticipation of fun activities. This is widely known among researchers and educators to boost ,academic success among all group ages.
Not only do children enrolled in extracurricular activities attend school more than others, but they also aspire to higher education more often and get better grades overall at school on average. Additional activities outside of school hours, such as football, chess, badminton, esports, and sports in general, alongside school clubs, greatly boost a youngster’s self-esteem, playing an important role in education.
But why would a school incorporate middle school esports, for example, into the curriculum instead of a philosophy club or a basketball team if it has to choose?
Our blog discusses how schools can leverage esports to build the job market skills students need for the next generation of work.
Gaming at Home Lacks Inclusion
Unfortunately, despite video games are a favorited activity of millions of children worldwide, they can be quite isolating past school, unless they are playing with friends and communicating. Many kids feel awkward in society and prefer to fall back into the virtual world, where everything has a goal and purpose, and things are much clearer.
For that reason, it is paramount to inspire children to join the school’s esports league. That can happen by first awarding them in-game cosmetics as a sign-up bonus. When they’ve given a try playing with people their age at school, there are rarely any dropouts from high school esports leagues or youth esports leagues like ,Vanta.
Giving children computers, internet access, and video games aren’t enough to call it a curricular activity. Professionals from Vanta Leagues advise schools to hire a trained coach for each game children are playing. Ensuring a safe, supervised environment is very important to developing a kid’s social skills.
School Esports Promote STEM Learning
According to ,many researchers and a series of studies dating back from 2016 to 2022, STEM is closely related to video gaming; not only technology is involved in both practices.
The qualities in a child to foster success in STEM education are greatly enhanced via video games. Such are:
- Scientific inquiry. In video games, to improve, the player must look back at their mistakes or the mistakes of others and seek a valid methodology to use in further playtime to optimize the overall process and beat the game or other players. Young players must develop hypotheses of their own and test them in real-time.
- Teamwork and Communication. In most online games, students join others in teams to compete. Video games improve teamwork, which leads to better social skills, usually used in STEM education mainly during team assignments and presentational projects.
- Empiric Data Gathering. In games, one must be aware of specific things like timings, numbers, and sequences. The player usually doesn’t have time to write these down and has to memorize them during the process, which fosters dynamic thinking and problem solving on the go.
- Access to Technology. Students from low-income families don’t have access to computers, technology, or the internet at home. How could they improve the skills listed above without these? For that reason, an extracurricular activity in the form of youth esports leagues would be greatly beneficial for most.
Esports Could Impress Universities or Lead to a Career
As we mentioned earlier in this article, esports has grown into a billion-dollar industry and will continue to double its worth over the next few years. That means careers in the sector will also thrive, and young talent is to be scouted both as players, commentators, or talent on Twitch streams and tournaments.
Who wouldn’t like to do what they love? Children aren’t the only ones that enjoy spending time playing video games. Of course, not all hobbies always turn into career growth opportunities. However, they might become a trampoline toward higher education.
Many universities are starting to recognize esports and ,give out scholarships to young players with recognized talent in games like League of Legends, Defense of the Ancients, CS: GO, PUBG, Starcraft II, and others.
How Could a Student Get an Esports Scholarship?
The first step toward landing a great esports scholarship is for the student to take part in youth esports leagues like Vanta Leagues or a locally organized league by their school. Since working with a trained coach would greatly boost their efficiency at the game and most universities screen out candidates by looking for the best players.
Often universities look at the competitive rank of students in-game and decide with the help of experts spectating the gameplay.
Conclusion
The majority of children play video games in one form or another. Esports has grown into a leading billion-dollar industry, which greatly increases the chances of getting accepted into university with an esports scholarship or finding a relevant career opportunity for interested students.
More schools should look into implementing esports leagues as an extracurricular activity because of the opportunities and the improved skills it gives children.