From Zero to An Esports Program in 3 Days

Esports — you’ve heard some version of this before — is becoming a big deal. It’s popular, it’s new, it’s fun, and it’s available at your high school through us. But, you’re thinking to yourself “how do I start an entire esports PROGRAM?”

You’re right that steps are required, but if you think it’s not doable in short order, well, it is! It’s possible and we’re gonna show you how it’s done. The scenario we're describing is not applicable to every school and, obviously, challenges unique to every situation will arise. But the goal here is to provide an idea of how, if things go smoothly, starting an esports program is much less daunting than it may initially seem. We’ll use a hypothetical coach (Gail Chester, a physics teacher) at a hypothetical school (Mark McGrath High School). Follow along as Ms. Chester becomes Coach Chester, head of the esports program at MMHS.

Day 1

Gail came across PlayVS and she’s pumped. Kids love video games, this’ll make ‘em more engaged at school — great, she’s in. So, she creates an account here. The next thing she does is get in touch with what we broadly call ‘the powers that be’. This could be an activities director, athletic director, vice principal, principal — whoever it is at the school who gets to make decisions about extracurricular activities. Sometimes that’s a simple, single conversation. Sometimes that requires escalation. Regardless of which one it is, the conversation goes well and Gail now has the task of letting students know esports is an option. 

Day 2

Gail knows her students. So she knows how to best reach them and spread the word by informing those interested in esports  to create an account here and register with Mark McGrath High School. She also sets up a school Discord server for any interested student to link up with other students and ask any questions they might have. As students sign up for PlayVS accounts, Gail then verifies that they attend MMHS in the platform. This adds them to the pool of potential players.

As the word trickles out and the Discord server fills up, Gail hears back from the powers that be and they’re into esports! The only issue is to make sure the computers in the library can run the games and the IT director approves. That’s not a problem, the IT director seems reasonable and most of the games can run just fine on the school computers — and Fortnite can be played on any device. But, Gail wants to cover her bases, so she sets up a call with one of our esports specialists to run her through a checklist for all the technical requirements necessary for her players to compete. 

Gail’s starting to get excited. Finally. Mark McGrath High will have an esports program.

Day 3

In the program Discord, Gail puts a link to an organizational video chat on Zoom/GoogleHangout to split up interested players into teams and get them practicing together. She schedules this after her consultation with one of our PlayVS specialists in order to feel confident about everything she needs to know.

During the meeting, she breaks students into teams, assigns team captains, inputs them into the PlayVS dashboard, enrolls them, and that’s it. Coach Chester just started Mark McGrath High's first ever esports program.

Mark McGrath High has an esports program now. Any student can be a part of it and it's only going to grow in the future. This scenario was ideal, but it's a version of what the process can look like at any high school. So, sign up and get your program up and running today!

Click here for a step-by-step walk-through on how to assemble and enroll teams. Still have questions? Email us at support@playvs.com