Esports On Fast Track To Becoming A High School-Sanctioned Sport
You can find a variety of sports teams at high schools worldwide, such as baseball teams, hockey, volleyball, swimming, tennis, football, and plenty more. Someday soon we might see a growing number of schools adding esports teams as well.
One high school in Ontario just recently decided to create their very own esports lounge at the school; during the lunch hour students can play games for fun. However, in the future they might put together a school team and from there they could also decide to enter various competitions, using money from the rewards to funnel back toward school supplies, trips, and more. You can also find similar esports lounges that have been set up at other schools in the US.
“It’s growing at a rapid pace, the schools have embraced it and we hope to reach a set of athletes who don’t participate in other sports,” said Marvin Chou, assistant director with the Montgomery-based Alabama High School Athletic Association.
Esports has been regarded as the world's fastest growing sport today, there's even talk that it could someday soon make its way into the Olympics. There's a great deal of money to be won from online gaming via tournament pools, monetization of videos, and more. Some teens and other gamers today are making thousands of dollars or more as a result of their gaming efforts.
This year, it was reported that esports programs were coming to schools across the United States for the very first time.
Many students have become accustomed to playing games at school over the years, to the discontent of teachers and parents. It's prompted many debates about whether or not video games should be banned during class time or from school altogether etc. If a school adopts an esports team and potentially financially profits from that sports team, it might not take long for them to adjust their view on gaming during class and perhaps they might reverse some of those bans or just ignore them altogether.
Some schools have gone a step further than a sports team and are now teaching students how to play games as a potential future profession.
One startup from Los Angeles, known as PlayVS, has been working to see that someday soon every school might have an esports team, along with the potential to compete on a state level. Even though there might not be many “official” school teams just yet, there are many groups and different organizations that have been created with the goal of trying to cultivate a school esports community.
The National Federation of State High Schools in the United States has previously agreed to sanction esports. And it isn't only high schools either, as esports popularity is also expected to grow significantly at the college level too.
Pics:
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