Prescott introduces an esport team

Prescott School District is now offering an esports program as an extracurricular activity. It is covered under Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA) as an activity and may later be categorized as a sport under the organization.

There has been considerable discussion about the value of esports in K-12 education. In 2018, the Pew Reseach Center reported that 97% of teen boys and 83% of teen girls played video games. Including esports as an extracurricular activity can help schools reach out to students who might not otherwise be engaged with school sports or clubs.

Eric Umphrey -This is the first year for esports in Prescott?

Travis Bradford - "Yes, it is. Yeah, it is the first year the whole state is doing it. They started in fall but this is our first time this spring."

E.U. - Are you under the WIAA?

T.B. - "It is under the WIAA as an activity, not a sport. So it doesn't have the same amount of rules as the sports do when it comes to grades and who can participate but we still try to support that idea because it is eventually going to turn into a sport. We are under the WIAA and they sanction everything and run the tournaments."

E.U. - Down the road are there scholarship implications for this?

T.B. - "Yeah, there already is at big colleges. So we play at CSL which is the collegiate sports league and that's going to be for eSports and they run esports. So just like in basketball or football you can get a full ride scholarship in eports as well."

E.U. - What games are you playing this first season?

T.B. - "Right now in Washington they have Street Fighter, Rocket League, Venture Valley and DOTA 2 (Defense of the Ancients). But right now our school is only taking on Rocket League because we only have three kids and some of the games require a different amounts of people."

E.U. - Is there a FIFA (soccer) league?

T.B. - "They were going to add FIFA but they didn't have enough support for it this year. Not enough schools wanted to do FIFA. They are not running any tournaments right now which upset the kids a little bit because they really wanted to play that game. Two weeks before the season started they cut that from the list this year but they are hoping to bring it next year."

E.U. - Who are you competing against this year?

T.B. – "Any school from across the state. Last week we played Tahoma, which is a pretty big school like 2,500 kids and so we are playing large schools. The other week we played Wapato which is like a middle sized school. We are playing all sizes of schools from the west side to over here. I think College Place is doing it and a couple of schools up north on this side of the state and then a lot of schools on the other side of the state are doing it."

E.U. - Any thoughts about trying to get someone at the college level to come down and talk to the kids?

T.B. – "I would hope so. Right now they have a Discord (Discord is an internet platform that offers invite-only pages for groups communicating online) for all the esports people. We all hop on there and the players and the coaches are on there and all of the administrators for WIAA are on there and so we go on there and talk all of the time. It would be really nice to coordinate with some of those people. CSL runs that entire Discord so the people that run esports run that Discord. If I could get in touch with them I could probably get someone to come down. It would be awesome for the kids to learn that they could take this to another level and could take them to more education for free."

E.U. - Anything you would like to tell parents that have kids that are interested in esports?

T.B. - "I think that esports gets a pretty bad rap because most people just hear you are playing video games. Some people have a really big issue with that. But I think what I have to say to parents is that you have to give it a chance because these things can actually teach kids a lot. Just like any other sport teaches them teamwork, teaches them collaboration, teaches them how to think strategically on certain games. I think there are a lot of really basic skills that can be learned by video games that you can take on into life and like any other sport hand eye coordination and mental building is a really big thing for esports. I think that people should give it a chance. Once you understand the game I think it is more fun to watch."

E.U. - I'm guessing right now you don't have a crowd in attendance when the kids are competing in meets?

T.B. - "No we don't but we are planning after spring break allowing spectators to come up here. I can run the game up on the projector in spectator mode so I can watch what is going on and coach. We are hoping after spring break to allow kids and parents to come up here if they want to. Right now we have matches every Tuesday."