Be An Academic Chapter

There are two options for how students can create a new IGDA Academic Chapter:

1. Option 1: Create a brand new chapter from scratch.
   • This means you must find at least two other students who are willing to help run the new chapter.
2. Option 2: Convert an existing school club into an IGDA Academic Chapter
   • If your school already has an existing student-run organization that focuses on game development, then the leadership of the club can apply to officially affiliate their club with the IGDA.
   • These clubs tend to have an established name and brand, such as “UA GameDev Club” or “VT Game Developers.” The club leadership can choose whether they would like to keep their existing name or to change their name to something more standard, such as “UA IGDA” or “IGDA GBC.”
   • Many clubs grow attached to their existing name and the reputation that the club has built up. However, using the IGDA name can often make it easier to attract industry sponsors and guest speakers. While a club’s existing name might be valuable internally in the school, the power of the IGDA’s name often becomes most apparent when making connections outside of the school.
   • The other major challenge that chapters face when choosing to keep their original name is that they often struggle to communicate their affiliation with the IGDA to their community. This results in chapters where their members don’t even realize their chapter is part of the IGDA. To avoid this problem, it’s important for chapters to feature the IGDA logo alongside their club name on their websites, banners, posters, and all other promotional material.

Once you’re ready to apply, follow these steps:

1. Verify that you have at least three students who are leaders of the Chapter.
   • Each of these students must join the IGDA.
2. Find a faculty member of your school who is willing to act as the Chapter’s faculty advisor.
   • This person is employed by the school, college, or university that your Chapter is associated with.
   • Because students graduate every year, the faculty advisor can also serve as a backup contact, to help the IGDA stay in touch with your Chapter.
3. Submit an application at the following link and wait for the call with IGDA Student SIG.

As an Academic Chapter affiliated with our Professional Chapter, here are some of the things we would like to take advantage

• Strategic Partnership through Talks, Workshops, and Thesis Panels we would love for your school to host one of our monthly meet ups which gives immediate access to your students. We can also help bridge the gap by creating events that cater to what your students need such as exposure to a multitude of games through game night, engine workshops for Unity, Unreal, paneling your thesis defense by giving valuable feedback, among other things. This will strengthen the local game development community and lead to potential career opportunities for the student members of Academic Chapters.
• Global Game Jam and GGJ Next where every year, we will encourage industry professionals to jam at your site. Global Game Jam encourages collaboration and the IGDA sites in the past allowed professionals to team up with students which provides them a valuable experience and overview of how professionals can create prototypes within 48 hours.
• Apply to IGDA Scholars where students can attend international conferences such as Game Developers Conference in the United States, and Melbourne International Games Week in Australia. The MIGW Scholarship Application ends in August 3, so we would like to encourage your members to apply.
• Mentorship with Local Industry Professionals which is headed by our Vice Chair, Paolo Jalbuena, where students can learn how to run their own community events while building relationships with our industry professionals and learning about the best industry practices.
• Utilize Access to International IGDA Special Interest Groups which hosts various online AMAs, workshops and tutorials This would allow your students to meet international game developers, and fellow students from across the globe.
• Get featured at the IGDA Insider which is open to paid members, game projects, event recaps, and community efforts.

If there are specific projects that your Academic Chapter would like to process, we are more than happy to assist in any way that we can.

Please do not hesitate to ask any questions, and perhaps we can discuss this further by setting an appointment with igda-philippines@googlegroups.com