'Incredible enthusiasm' of lecturers helps DMU games courses win accreditation

Three games development courses at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) have been backed by one of the biggest groups in UK video games.

TIGA, the trade association which represents the UK video games industry, has given full accreditation to DMU’s BSc (Hons) Computer Games Programming, BSc (Hons) Games Production and BA (Hons) Game Art.

 In doing so, the group - which runs the annual TIGA Games Awards - praised the course for offering “skills the industry needs”, the number of high-profile guest lecturers and speakers from the games industry and the level of equipment available to students to help them develop software.

 Associate Professor Mark Wickham, TIGA Educational Advisor & Director of Computer Arts and Technology, Norwich University, said: “The course teams delivering games at DMU demonstrated incredible enthusiasm and a commitment to the student experience. De Montfort has a strong history in this subject area and students can be proud to graduate from a TIGA accredited course.”

Teodora Kuzmanova, Programme Leader for the BA Hons Game Art at DMU, said:

“Our Game Art BA is a specialised creative course and we make great use of guest lecturers to help to inspire the students and prepare them for the workplace. This TIGA accreditation shows that the industry recognises our consistent high quality and success. Their continued support has always opened doors for our graduates.” “Our Game Art BA (Hons) is a specialised course designed to support and enable personal growth in synch with development of professional skills for entry into the creative industries. Industry professionals are invested in our course, and we are very lucky to have frequent industry guest lecturers to help inspire our students and prepare them for the workplace. The TIGA accreditation shows that industry recognise our consistent high quality and success. Their continued support has always opened doors for our graduates.”

In a statement about the awards, the TIGA Accreditation Team said they were impressed by many examples of best practice from the DMU courses, including:                                            

• Equipping students with both the specific skills that industry needs (e.g. C++ and debugging skills) and more transferable skills such as team working, problem solving and compromising
• The use of industry tools and pipelines such as Jira and GIT is good. Student access to PlayStation and Switch DEV kits is beneficial to the student experience and industry preparedness.
• Creative events and associations like Game Jams and the Games Development Society
• The “excellent” initiative to employ the students to work with staff and on commercial research and knowledge exchange projects
• Interview preparation, portfolio review, and the supported development of soft skills is a valuable addition to the core course content.
• The “sheer amount” of dedicated resource each student has access to.

Dr Conor Fahy, Deputy Programme Leader BSc Computer Games Programming and the BSc Games Production, said: “We’re delighted with this accreditation. It’s great for our students and great for the programs. We have a talented team who have put a lot of work into designing and implementing these programs which consistently produce fantastic graduates, so it’s wonderful to have all of this validated by a respected organization like TIGA.”