Revenue from the global video industry totaled over $184 billion in 2022, beating both global film and US sports markets, and Sherman High School’s new after school esports club is preparing students for this emerging market and even teaching more widely applicable skills.
“Esports promotes teamwork and communication skills in small group settings,” said Jeff Chancellor, coordinator of career and military workforce development. “This program also encourages healthy competition and provides a sense of community within our school for those students interested in these programs.”
Chancellor charged computer science teacher Justin Burch with managing the extracurricular club at the start of the year. He runs it like any other team and has implemented the “no pass, no play” rule to ensure his players are balancing academics with their club activities.
“Studies have shown that esports can improve the player’s rate of passing their classes because they have more investment,” Burch said. “I care about the academic success of my students as much as they care about their competitive success.”
Players also pick up skills such as identifying strengths and weaknesses in their own play styles as well as their teammates’. Much like a tennis duo, they cover for each other’s weaknesses.
“If you have a bad matchup against an opponent and know you’re the first to go, you can talk to your teammates who might have a better matchup,” Burch said. “You can switch up the order then.”
The club also has applications and crossover with Burch's video game design class, offered during the school day to help students discover and build pathways in this emerging career field. Burch and his players talk about how in-game characters are created and how they interact with each other and the virtual world, which is useful information in developing a basic understanding of the game.
“I teach these lessons from an esports perspective, but they have real game design applicability,” Burch said. “We also talk about how game balance works and is set up for our games, which is an important part of any game design class.”
Practice occurs after school or in the students’ own free time with players connecting to practice at home. Sophomore Hein Htet captains the school team for Hearthstone (an online strategy card game), and he’s taken novice players under his wing and taught them different strategies.
“I was the only one on the team with experience, and I and Coach Burch had to train them from the start,” Htet said. “They learned really quickly. Hearthstone is a game you can play easily, but mastering it takes a lot of practice. I think they’re on the way to mastery.”
During the regular season, games are entirely online, but players have a chance to attend an in-person competition if they do well enough in the playoffs. Senior Kevin Wrenn captains the team for Super Smash Bros (a fighting game) and also competes by himself in another league. The solo league offers a chance to play in its national championship at Orlando, Fla.
“This was just a game I played to have fun at first. This hadn’t been something where I thought I could make it big,” said Wren, who will soon compete for a spot. “But after competing in esports here, it opened my eyes to the possibility that I could make a career out of this.”
Burch sees the esports market growing in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, especially with the addition of a dedicated arena in Arlington. Colleges are implementing more esports programs, and some, like University of Texas-Dallas, are offering scholarships for talented esports players.
“On a professional level, you see people have full-time careers in esports, whether it’s through pure competitive success or a pivot into content creation on YouTube,” Burch said. “Just as any other professional sport has a place in building team skills, developing academic success and preparing yourself for the future, I think esports has the exact same qualities.”
Wrenn could possibly be one of those kinds of professional esports players, but he’s focused on earning a computer science degree first. He said the key to becoming good in anything, be it esports or not, is to have the drive to be better.
“At tryouts, there were people who didn’t have the knowledge, but I could see the potential because they were willing to dedicate themselves to the game,” Wrenn said. “If you’re willing to put in the time and try to be better, you can be good, possibly amazing at anything.”
