SYRACUSE — Jan. 26-27 wasn’t a typical weekend for thousands of college students, including more than two dozen in Central New York, as they gathered to take part in a planet-straddling game-creating event.

Global Game Jam, organized by a group of the same name, took place at 803 spots around the world, attracting 42,800 participants in 108 countries. Combined, participants created 8,597 games.

On Jan. 26, as 5 p.m. struck in each time zone, participants learned what the theme was for this year’s event. Then they chose teams from among themselves and set to work creating games — video games, card games, or even board games.

They had 48 hours, until 5 p.m. Sunday, to complete their work and share it with the world on Global Game Jam’s website (globalgamejam.org). 

Syracuse event

By Saturday evening, midway through the event, teams at Syracuse University were deep into their work. Haley Knapp, a senior studying music, history, and culture at Syracuse’s College of Arts and Sciences, was putting together the soundtrack to play with the game her team was creating.

To match the Global Game Jam theme, “transmission,” the team was creating a game called “Mursil,” an Arabic word meaning “transmitter.”

Junior Anjelica Escalante, who is majoring in English and textual studies at the College of Arts and Sciences, was creating the story script, including dialogue for the characters. Mursil was to be a “choose-your-adventure” game where players can decide what to do next and each choice would bring a different result.

“Middle Eastern steam punk visual” is how Knapp described the look of the game, with cartoon-style characters in the foreground and sepia-toned backgrounds.” The soundtrack she was working on was “Pan-Asian fusion” with music and instruments from the region.

The idea of the game is to take steps to fix a transmitter in time for a festival, lest the ruler get angry with your family.

The task of making the game work on a computer fell to Alexander Jansing, a graduate student at SUNY Polytechnic Institute who works as a senior consultant for Booz Allen Hamilton in Rome. He was focused on writing in open-source software called Ren’Py and had a clear goal. “My thing is I just want to get a game finished. One of the most important parts of this is getting it finished,” he says.

At 28, he’s seven years older than his teammates. That’s not unusual, area Game Jam organizers say. The event attracts plenty of students but also adults who are just interested in games. Like Jansing, Knapp, and Escalante, many don’t even know each other before the event begins, but they team up shortly after the start.

In this case, Jansing showed up about three hours into the Game Jam. “Alex saved the day,” Knapp says, noting that neither she nor Escalante are coders.

“For people who don’t know each other, we work together pretty well,” says Escalante.

Knapp, Escalante, and Jansing successfully completed their game. It was named “Most Immersive” of the nine games completed at the university’s event, says John Sanders, one of the campus organizers.

Sanders is a fan of games. (Sid Meier’s “Civilization” is a favorite, he says.) A Ph.D. student in English, with a concentration in film, screen and game studies, he spent Global Game Jam moving from area to area at the university library watching over game developers, offering tips, and ordering pizza.

Morrisville event

The ability to collaborate with others is something employers value, Morrisville State College President David Rogers says in a phone interview. His school has hosted Global Game Jam for the past nine years, in part to encourage students to develop those skills.

“They are not just people who know how to code or build things or grow things,” he says of Morrisville students. They are able to be creative and work with others creatively.

The college has more than a dozen student-run enterprises on campus, Rogers says. Products include ice cream and flowers, and services include car repair. Morrisville also has semester-long internships where students spend a portion of their senior year in the working world.

Compared to the work involved in creating and maintaining those programs, deciding to support Game Jam was laughably easy, Rogers says. “I said, ‘are you kidding me?’” he recalled when Morrisville Professor Richard Marcoux first floated the idea.

“Anytime our faculty can find a way for our students to learn skills employees are looking for, we will,” he says. “It instills confidence in them,” he adds. And “working in teams is what employers are looking for.”

This year Marcoux reports that the Morrisville event drew 15 participants. They broke into teams and created four games.

“It’s not a competition,” Marcoux says, explaining that the concept of Global Game Jam has always been to give people interested in game making a chance to get together and create. The Morrisville event has drawn students over the years as well as Morrisville alumni and people who live in the area.

It’s even drawn people from other colleges, Marcoux says. He says visitors from Syracuse University and Ithaca College came several years back, saw what was going on, and decided to host their own events.

Marcoux, who fondly recalls buying a few cases of caffeinated soda for the first Global Game Jam at Morrisville, is already planning for next year. For the 10th anniversary he and Rogers are planning to invite back all past participants.

Rogers, who was the dean of Morrisville’s school of business when he first approved having the event there, says the college is now considering the possibility of creating a game-design major. It may be an option or minor first. It’s a long process to develop and get approval for such a move, he says.

But Rogers is obviously impressed by what game makers offer. Students who combine creativity and the ability to work in teams aren’t common, he says. “But they show up in droves for Game Jam.” 

UTICA — In five years, a third of the state’s 270,000 teachers will be eligible to retire, according to the New York State Teachers Retirement System (NYTRS).

Already, more than 50,000 active teachers are older than 55, NYTRS statistics show.

At the same time, the supply of new teachers in New York state is declining, according to a fact sheet from the New York State United Teachers. 

“Since 2009-10, enrollment in teacher education programs in New York has decreased by roughly 49 percent — from more than 79,000 students to about 40,000 students in 2014-15,” NYSUT reports. “Anecdotally, teacher education programs report those numbers have declined further in the last two years,” it added.

Of those students who do graduate with teaching degrees in New York, an estimated 10 percent leave the state to work elsewhere, NYSUT said in a May 2017 news release it labeled, “Severe teacher shortage looms for New York State.”

To help alleviate that shortage, Utica College is re-introducing an accelerated program designed to get aspiring teachers in front of classrooms.

The initiative targets individuals holding bachelor’s degrees in courses of study that are in high demand. Students who complete a summer course of study and pass required exams will earn a New York State Transitional B Certificate, the college says.

That certificate will allow them to secure a full-time teaching job by this fall, according to the college. After that, the new teachers will have as long as five years to complete the remaining work for a master’s degree in education.

Transitional B teacher certificates are offered by 17 institutions around the state. Utica College says its program is the only one in Central New York. However, some institutions, such as SUNY Empire State College, offer much of the program through online classes with some in-person requirements.

“This program is ideal for people who are already in careers but want to make the switch to teaching,” says John Rowe, executive director of graduate admissions at Utica College. “It prepares teachers faster and gets them in classrooms where they’re needed most.”

The college says 30 school districts in Upstate New York have said they are interested in teachers with specific areas of certification. The districts are in Oneida, Herkimer, and Madison counties. In addition, Rowe says the college is working with the Syracuse City School District to prepare its teaching assistants and substitute teachers for certification through the program.

A survey the school sent out last year found area school districts anticipating a need to hire teachers. Now, Rowe says, the districts expect to hire dozens of new teachers in the next few years.

“They see it coming,” he says, explaining that the program ran for several years in the early 2000s, but was shelved when the recession dropped demand for new teachers.

The program at Utica College can accommodate 20 to 25 students, Rowe estimates. Those students will need to show they had a 3.0 or better GPA for their undergraduate degree. The program is targeting those with degrees in in-need areas — English, French, social studies, Spanish, biology, chemistry, earth science, physics, mathematics, and technology.

The admission process will include an application and an interview with a committee including college faculty in the education department and local school superintendents, Rowe says.

“This will be a highly competitive process,” he adds, noting that more than 100 individuals have already inquired about applying. He suggests that those interested in applying first email him (jrowe@utica.edu) their college transcripts — to make sure they meet the basic qualifications.

The summer program will start in May and run through August with participants taking nine graduate credits worth of study on Monday and Wednesday evenings. They will also need to take a state test to become teachers.

The entire master’s program will cost about $33,000, including roughly $7,200 for the portion of the program that will take place this summer, Rowe says. He adds that students may qualify for unsubsidized loans. 

Applications for the program are due by Feb. 28.

Those who are successful in the summer program will still need to complete their master’s degree to go from Transitional B to full teacher certification. 

Rowe adds that those who don’t qualify for the program at this time can take evening courses at the school that could get them qualified when the program is offered again. 

“We anticipate running this once a year for a few years,” Rowe says, as long as school districts still have a need for new teachers.           

UTICA — With undergraduate enrollment up more than 20 percent, Utica College is planning to build new housing on campus for 144 students.

More than 100 Utica College students currently stay at the nearby Ramada, says Jeffery Gates, the school’s senior VP for student life and enrollment management. The new housing will allow those students to live on campus and accommodate some growth beyond, he says.

The housing will consist of three three-story buildings holding four-bedroom apartments, each designed to hold four students. They will be built by the school’s tennis courts, near Nye Ave.

To blend with the nearby neighborhood, the housing will not be traditional brick, Gates says. Instead it will be built clapboard-sided with conventional roofs. There will not be access to Nye Ave. from the dorms, he adds. “We want to be good neighbors.”

The project is expected to cost between $13 million and $14 million, Gates says, and will be funded by a public-private partnership including BBL, the college, and the Utica Municipal Housing Authority.

“The students want to be on campus,” Gates says. He adds that beyond those currently lodged at the Ramada, other students live elsewhere off campus.

Utica College has seen enrollment rise — from 2,064 in 2014 to 2,521 last fall — since it “reset” its tuition rate below $20,000 starting in the fall of 2016. In addition, Gates says, “the college offers 16 of the 20 majors that students and their families are searching for today.”

Work is expected to begin late this spring and finish in time for students to move in for the fall 2019 semester.

SYRACUSE — The U.S. Small Business Administration’s (SBA) microloan program would expand under legislation that the U.S. Senate is considering.

The proposed Microloan Modernization Act would expand the SBA program that provides loans and technical assistance to entrepreneurs who “face challenges” accessing the capital needed to start and expand small businesses because “they are often denied loans by banks,” the office of U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand said in a Jan. 26 news release.

Gillibrand discussed the legislation during a Jan. 26 appearance at Right Price Companies Inc. at 4726 S. Salina St. in Syracuse. 

The SBA microloan program makes direct loans and grants to intermediary, nonprofit organizations that in turn provide microloans of up to $50,000 and business-based training and technical assistance to startup and growing small businesses, according to Gillibrand’s release. The average loan amount is $13,000.

The legislation would “strengthen” the SBA microloan program by raising the total limit on outstanding loans to intermediary lending organizations, which would allow for more loans to be made to women, minority, and other business owners, according to Gillibrand’s release.

The total amount of loans outstanding and committed to any intermediary … from the SBA business loan and investment fund would be increased from $5 million to $6 million for the remaining years of the intermediary’s participation in the program.

Supporting the bill

In her remarks at the Right Price Companies, Gillibrand explained why she is supporting the proposal.

“The banks either say that the startup business is too risky for an investment or that they don’t have enough credit history to let the bank feel comfortable lending to them,” Gillibrand said. 

Many of those same entrepreneurs, Gillibrand noted, also “struggle” to get the attention of early-stage and venture-capital investors who help other startup businesses “get off the ground.” 

As a result, she added, too many entrepreneurs are “stopped in their tracks” when they try to get their first loan from a bank to start their businesses. 

“And more often than not, the people who lose out are women and minority-owned businesses. So, we have to fix this … We have to make our credit system fair for any entrepreneur in the state who’s willing to take a risk and strengthen their community by starting their own business,” said Gillibrand.

“That’s been one of the challenges since day one … being that we are first-generation entrepreneurs, we had to figure a lot of things out and one of the things that’s been difficult to figure out is access to capital,” Darin Price, COO of Right Price Companies, said.

On its website, Right Price Companies describes itself as “the only dual certified, woman/minority owned furniture distributor in upstate New York,” specializing in commercial furniture and case goods sales. 

Besides additional loans, the proposal would also expand opportunities for more hands-on training assistance to help small-business owners succeed. 

The U.S. House of Representatives has already approved the legislation, which Gillibrand describes as “bipartisan.” 

Sen. Deb Fischer (R–Neb) is the bill’s lead sponsor, Gillibrand noted in her remarks.

The bill is also co-sponsored by U.S. Senators Tim Scott (R–S.C.), Chris Coons (D–Del.), Jeanne Shaheen (D–N.H.), Joe Donnelly (D–Ind.), and Gary Peters (D–Mich.).

The proposed legislation would provide “another important tool” in the effort to “build and grow” the small-business community, Robert Simpson, president and CEO of CenterState CEO, said in his remarks at the event.

“I want to make sure that the Senator knows that we understand that it’s incumbent on us here in our community to create our own resources and to do work, too. We appreciate and need the support of the federal government but it’s equally important for us in Central New York to be intentional about our own efforts to support entrepreneurs,” said Simpson.

Since its inception, the SBA microloan program has delivered more than $722 million in loans to small businesses across the U.S. that have created or retained 212,000 jobs. The program loaned more than $8.4 million to 821 New York entrepreneurs and business owners “in fiscal year 2017 alone,” Gillibrand’s office said.

A group of 10 Fort Drum soldiers have completed a training program through SUNY Polytechnic Institute (SUNY Poly) that provided skills and connected them to New York’s advanced manufacturers.

The 56-hour, hands-on training program is a partnership between SUNY Poly, the school’s Northeast Advanced Technological Education Center (NEATEC), Jefferson Community College (JCC), Mohawk Valley Community College (MVCC), and the Fort Drum’s Soldier For Life-Transition Assistance Program.

The National Science Foundation funded the project to provide “marketable, in-demand skills” to transitioning soldiers, SUNY Poly said.

“We are proud that SUNY Poly and NEATEC, in collaboration with our educational and governmental partners, are once again supporting the attainment of technical skills that can provide a bridge for soldiers as they transition into civilian life, paving the way for job interviews and opportunities that will allow these soldiers to positively leverage their military experience and skillset to obtain important jobs that are in-demand throughout the region,” Bahgat Sammakia, interim president of SUNY Poly, said in a news release.

This is the third group of soldiers to participate in such training since NEATEC began working with the Soldier for Life-Transition Assistance Program at Fort Drum in 2015. The partnership was created to “establish a pipeline” of soldiers interested in working as technicians in advanced manufacturing.

About the training

Training is offered to soldiers scheduled to separate from service within a year, as well as some recently transitioned veterans.

While initially offering training related to radio frequency and pneumatics, the program has expanded to include advanced-manufacturing practices, pneumatics technology, and mechatronics. The topic selection and course objectives for this workshop series were based upon conversations with SUNY Poly’s industrial partners, the school said.

Current and former MVCC faculty developed and taught the curriculum. The first two trainings were offered entirely on the MVCC campus, but this most recent training was split between MVCC and JCC.

Numerous companies have participated in the program, meeting with soldiers to talk about their organizations, products, and employment opportunities, including Clinton–based Indium Corporation; Danfoss Silicon Power, a German company with a Utica facility; Plattsburgh–based Norsk Titanium; Milpitas, California–headquartered GlobalFoundries, which operates location in Albany and East Fishkill in Dutchess County; SUNY Poly’s Albany NanoTech Complex Foundry; Panasonic Eco Solutions Solar NY of Buffalo; Bartell Machinery of Rome; HMI Metal Powders-Pratt & Whitney in Clayville, south of Utica; Anaren Inc. of DeWitt; and the Watertown location of Allied Motion, which is headquartered in the Buffalo suburb of Amherst.