A recent survey by HBCU Connect, commissioned by Microsoft, found that of 200 respondents, approximately 95% of college students and alumni of HBCUs across the country shared their interest in a career in the gaming industry, including 34% of respondents said they were specifically interested in program management roles, 24% were interested in engineering roles, and 18% were interested in gaming development roles. This week marks National Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) Week in the United States, which occurs annually in September, an initiative led by the White House Initiative on Advancing Educational Equity, Excellence and Economic Opportunity through Historically Black Colleges and Universities ( HBCUs), to recognize the contributions of these institutions to the US and to commemorate the impact of HBCUs on American culture.
Gaming is a leading form of entertainment, but to date, only 2% of video game industry professionals are black, compared to 13% of the US population. Working with members of the Black Communities on Xbox, Xbox is trying to improve on that metric and close this gap by promoting pipelines for black people and youth in the gaming industry. Introducing: Project Amplify – a video series that aims to increase black voices within Xbox to inspire, educate and motivate youth in the US to pursue careers in the game industry through real-life stories from black leaders and workers in the Xbox ecosystem.
Project reinforcement features fourteen Black employees from across the Xbox each sharing advice, insights into their current roles, and highlights from their time in the gaming industry. This video series aims to educate young people about the diversity of roles within the gaming industry, while highlighting some of the black people who work in those roles on a daily basis. On behalf of the Black Communities on Xbox, co-leads shared their personal stories in the video series from their journey into the gaming industry, including:
- “Growing up, I didn’t really have a vision of what my career would be. I decided to go to college thinking it was a way to “get a good job” and escape poverty, but even as a freshman computer science student I still had a very smattering of the opportunities the tech industry offered me. offered. During my university experience and with internships, I learned more about how big the world is – how many companies, careers and pathways there are to find or create a job that you love. I want more people to know they have options, nothing is impossible or out of reach for them and encourage them to pursue their passions early.” – Q Muhaimin, Product Manager
- “In my early years I was more focused on what not to do versus what I could be. It wasn’t until my adult years that I learned to use my passion for games in a career. I am now incredibly grateful to be celebrating 10+ years in my dream career and I hope Project reinforcement
inspires people to dream and take action towards their own goals. As my coaches and mentors would say, “play to win instead of play not to lose.” – James Lewis, Senior Business Development Manager
To launch this initiative, Xbox is partnering with the 2022 Revolt Summit x AT&T for a two-day event (September 24-25) to reach students and gaming enthusiasts through on-site industry panels and networking opportunities with members of the Black Communities on Xbox.
For additional resources:
Learn the basics of programming and C# with the following tutorials:
Introduction to C#: Written tutorial with sample projects that take you from “hello world” to numbers, loops, some basic data structures, and OOP concepts like inheritance.
C# 101: A video series along the same lines as the written tutorial.
Once you’re comfortable with the basics and C#, try Unity courses:
First, go through Getting Started with Unity to familiarize yourself with the Editor and some basic aspects of Unity
Then continue Create with Code to get more hands-on with coding solutions in Unity
Download and learn the basics of Unreal Engine with tutorials:
Download – Unreal Engine: select the “Creators License” option
Unreal Online Learning – Unreal Engine: A free learning platform that provides hands-on video courses and guided learning paths.
Learn more about game design:
Some game designers at Xbox Game Studios consider these two GDC (Game Developers Conference) presentations to be very informative and inspiring if you’re into game design.
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