Marietta, Ga. (May 12, 2009) – The University System of Georgia’s Board of Regents approved a Bachelor of Science degree in computer game design and development (CGDD) for Southern Polytechnic State University today, the first of its kind for a public institution in the state of Georgia.
The new degree program is expected to increase enrollment in the School of Computing and Software Engineering. Although the department offered a concentration in game design and development, the students typically pursuing a computer science degree were already professionals in the industry with little interest in gaming. The new program is designed to attract more traditional college students to increase the number of computer game programmers, a need that the gaming industry is looking to fill.

“The gaming industry can get those people with design skills,” says Dr. Han Reichgelt, dean of the School of Computing and Software Engineering, “but they can’t find the programmers they need. We hope that our program will help put these game programmers into the market.”
The CGDD program will equip students and graduates with the skills and knowledge to apply computing and software engineering techniques to the design and production of digital media for entertainment, research and education.

“This new program will benefit not only Southern Poly in terms of enrollment but the Atlanta metro area as well by creating more careers and expanding the economy. If we start producing those game programmers and keep attracting those gaming companies, then there is the possibility of setting up a very vibrant gaming industry in Atlanta,” says Dr. Reichgelt.

In summer 2008, SPSU opened a game design and development lab to strengthen the gaming concentrations in software engineering and to support and increase the success rates of students in introductory programming courses. The lab includes 14 game development stations for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii consoles, though they use Xbox as its primary platform. Dr. Reichgelt hopes that with the new degree program they can expand the game lab not just in terms of seating capacity, but in the number of platforms that students can develop for, including portable devices such as the Nintendo DS or Apple’s iPhone.
This is SPSU’s ninth new degree program since 2006. Last month, the Board of Regents approved a master’s program in information and instructional design for SPSU’s School of Arts and Sciences.