UVic-UCC will offer a degree course to train specialists in video game and mobile and web applications

The Faculty of Science and Technology (FCT) at UVic-UCC will offer a Degree in Multimedia. Applications and Video Games, starting from next year. This course with instruction on the Vic campus will train technology professionals in the design and development of multimedia applications and media, with particular emphasis on video games, web and mobile device applications, and on integrating the systems that may operate in these environments.

The curriculum supplements this training in creativity and programming with a grounding in entrepreneurship skills and knowledge, communication and marketing in audiovisual and digital business. "Graduates joining teams working in this field will need a cross-disciplinary professional profile, and knowledge of both programming and digital media," says Laura Dempere, Dean of the FCT. As a result, the new degree course "covers programming, design and communication so that the future graduates are able to work in multidisciplinary teams, and undertake multimedia projects from the initial concept to the commercialisation stage, including design and development," says Dempere.

To achieve this, the degree course introduces various subjects based on Project-Based Learning methodology, and reinforces cross-disciplinary competencies related to personal and professional development in entrepreneurship, innovation, teamwork and communication in different languages. Starting in the first year, students will work in teams on integrated projects, based on the cross-disciplinary content of all the subjects they are studying. According to Dempere, the future graduates will be "professionals with an essential profile in today's digital and hyper-connected society, because they will be experts in developing tools and solutions that are at the heart of the Internet of Things) paradigm."

Growing demand for professionals in the digital sphere

The new Degree in Multimedia. Applications and Video Games is a response to companies' increasing need to recruit professionals who are experts in new design and creativity technologies, and to take advantage of the potential that digital platforms offer for innovation and promotion. According to the report on "A Digital Single Market Strategy for Europe" produced by the European Commission in 2015, the demand for skilled professionals in the digital sphere is growing at a rate of 4% per year. The same report warns that the lack of professionals with these profiles could amount to 825,000 jobs by 2020.

Meanwhile, the "White Paper for the design of university degrees in the context of the digital economy", produced by the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Energy and Tourism in 2015, highlights the speed with which new qualifications and new digital business models are progressing, and the fact that the profiles that were in the highest demand in this field a year before did not even exist a decade ago. Areas such as video games, digital design and art, animation, 3D environments, digital content and digital marketing and communication are among the profiles for which demand is highest. The same document points out that there are as yet few centres providing qualifications that match the profiles in demand in this sector, compared to the growing demand in the market for flexible profiles in the creative and technological fields, such as animation and video games.