A local Norwegian newspaper made a story on our trip to Rena. We got a scan of the article from Nina Ree-Lindstad and translated it with the help of online dictionaries. Some inaccuracies may occur.
Full SCORE for game development
Assistant Professor Nina Ree-Lindstad, Coordinator of the Bachelor of Game Programming, gave a near full score to the Finnish students who visited Rena students this week.
- A brilliant idea, she describes their game development club.
- By creating a club of their own, students have a more competent status when applying for a job. Being a part of an established community with talented people is an advantage when promoting themselves to employers, Teemu Haila says.
On Monday, he was with the club president Juho Hartikainen and club member Heikki Leppänen at Hedmark University College in Rena to inspire students in Bachelor of Game Programming to establish a club of their own. With the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) helping organize the event, the lads presented their project to the students and representatives from the game industry who had taken the trip to Rena.
A school inside a school
Just a year ago, Haila founded the game development club SCORE which, after six months of trial and error, would turn out to be a project of huge success. SCORE is a student club with around 20 active members from the School of Art and Media in Tampere, Finland.
Haila, Hartikainen and Leppänen all see the club from varied perspectives: one as a founder, one as a president and one as a member. They think they get a lot in return by being active with the club.
– There’s a lot we can learn through this program. By organizing ourselves and by studying this way, we might avoid many mistakes in the future. The project is like a school inside a school, where we learn a lot from fellow students, says Leppänen.
Brilliant
Members of SCORE utilise the club partially to deal with their normal schoolwork. Students can take their club projects and develop them further as a school assignment.
At Hedmark University College, the main focus is on the theoretical side, which essentially provides the base for work.
- Here at the institute, we are committed to give our students a good theoretical foundation. We hope that SCORE has inspired Rena students to start their own projects outside of school. The potential is huge and working together in this way is a brilliant idea, says Tone Vold.
As the leader of IGDA Hamar and the general manager of game company Tumbleweed, Kristoffer Jetmundsen is also satisfied with the guests.
- A very good initiative from the college here in Rena!
More desirable
SCORE has also awakened interest among large companies. Microsoft is one of their unofficial sponsors. With common fields of interest, SCORE and Microsoft exchange experience and are as such linked on a more personal level.
Second-year student at game programming, Arild Jacobsen, thinks the idea is good, and believes that experience from such a game club would make him more desirable to potential employers when he graduates.
- But for this to be seen as particularly positive from the employer’s side, the club should not be operated as part of the school curriculum. Employers will see that we take the initiative outside of school. School may add their part in boosting students’ professional competences throughout the year, said Jacobsen, who wonders whether there are students who have time to start such a project.
(caption) REACHING FOR THE SKIES: Art at the college in Rena is reaching for the skies to inspire students. So far, it seems like the SCORE gang is going to the same direction. On the top sits Heikki Leppänen (left) and Teemu Haila, while Juho Hartikainen hangs on the front. Kristoffer Jetmundsen, Nina Ree-Lindstad and Tone Vold stand on the ground.
