Odds are your kids spend a huge deal of time and money on video games. If you think they’re not very productive, think again. And if you’re a hardcore gamer yourself, this piece of news is bound to make you happy as a flea in a doghouse.
Robert Morris University-Illinois (formerly Robert Morris College) is offering scholarships for players of League of Legends. Widely known as LoL, it is a popular multiplayer video game with 27 million gamers playing daily. The free-to-play game was launched on 2009 and it has never looked back since. As previously mentioned on NY Daily News, it was reported that the scholarships will cover up to $19,000 per student.
“League of Legends is a fast-paced, competitive online game that blends the speed and intensity of an RTS with RPG elements. Two teams of powerful champions, each with a unique design and playstyle, battle head-to-head across multiple battlefields and game modes. ” — League of Legends
The exciting eSports programme was announced this month, but it has already garnered quite of bit of attention from magazines and websites. The story was picked up by PC Gamer Magazine, The Mary Sue, and Times of India. When Associate Athletic Director Kurt Melcher heard of the news, he described that there are two sides. “There’s the gamers side, who feel like they’ve been vindicated or liberated,” he said. “Then there’s the hardcore athletes side, who say, ‘What do you mean? That’s not a sport.” Melcher is currently attached to the school’s new programme.
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Proving that they’re determined to blow away the competition, the school is going the extra mile to hire a coach for its team. Starting this September, the school is going to recruit students into the Collegiate Star League, the premier eSports league for colleges across North America. The scholarships will cover up to 50 percent of tuition and 50 percent of room and board. According to Robert Morris University-Illinois, they are among the first in the nation to offer such significant scholarships of this variety.
The school’s athletic teams are known as the Eagles. They dabble in a wide range of sports and have accomplished in bowling, basketball, and ice hockey. They are now focusing on shorter-term goals; the school is planning to get into the The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NACC) finals competition, and be one of the teams playing for the collegiate championship.
“It’s not like traditional sports, it’s esports, there are differences that exist in that realm. But as far as how the school will treat them, they’ll be looked at and treated the same way as our basketball players or football players.” — Associate Athletic Director Kurt Melcher
According to Melcher, the school will accept between 45 and 50 qualified eSports applicants for their League of Legends team. Acceptance will be judged base on applicants’ eSports participation in high school.
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