Life Changing or Career Building?

The current climate In University's is getting tougher and tougher for students to get the most out of their time spent there, and the skills they need to progress on to the job they've been pursuing. With increasing amounts of avenues for people to take to learn skills and technical abilities for the job they want becoming available, as well as the increase in tuition fee's its easy to see why people would opt out of the higher education route. 
Especially in terms of the educational path to a job in the Game's Industry, there are more and more resources online, tutorials, etc.  that give you a comprehensive insight into the skills you need, and what tech and software you need to do it with. Also with the way that a lot of professional game companies are outsourcing to other specialist studios more and more makes it difficult to a fresh graduate to break into the industry, so the prospect of studying for 3 years to then struggle to even get in is daunting. 

I think for a games related course to stay up to date and provide the best for students is to combine the basic knowledge they need in any creative environment with up to date software and skills needed in industry.... This may go against what certain companies are after when they ask for creative abilities and being a good team player over actual qualifications, but that's  just it... every company will have their own attitude for hiring new talent, and its up to the student to be prepared with as much as possible to be able to adapt to any job opportunity thrown at them.

The main thing people need is a balance. A balance of both key traditional values, that are hard to be taught outside of a focused teaching environment and a teaching structure that focuses on up to date software being learnt as well as tasks set around those seen in industry to prepare people for the conditions for getting out there into the big bad world of work. I think Game Art here has got that pretty much in how they deal with things, though I think that the pressure of working in an educational environment that reproduces that of industry is definitely tough to work under, its effective at toughening you up to the right mindset so that we'll be ready for industry jobs. Though a lot of people that came here had come from foundation art courses and similar not everyone had an art background, like me: I came from 4 years doing graphic design, so I was never taught the basics of perspective and anatomy as much as I needed. But since coming here I've learnt A LOT of stuff that has been incredibly helpful, and in such a short space of time as well. University as a whole has equipped me mentally to be able to deal with things, and handle work professionally so I think it is still a key route that young people should take if they hope to progress into the job they want.

My planned celebratory dance for future job offers