Inside the Alberta Scholastic Esports League with Shadi Hanna
Summer's over, and for student gamers in Alberta, that means it's time for a fresh start and a new way to compete! Whether you’re into titles like Super Smash Bros, Rocket League, or Valorant, this fall marks a pivotal moment for scholastic esports in the province.
The Alberta Scholastic Esports League is now dawning its own banner to foster a community of connection for students and representing their schools at competitions, while supporting teachers and schools with growing their own form of an esports program.
After a successful pilot "year zero," ASEL is ready to build on its incredible momentum and continue creating a new ecosystem for students to connect, compete, and represent their schools.
Key Takeaways
The Alberta Scholastic Esports League (ASEL) is now an independent nonprofit, entering its first official year after operating as an initiative by the academic subcommittee within the Alberta Esports Association last year.
ASEL's 2030 goal is to have an esports program, even a small one, in every middle and high school in Alberta.
For schools needing to prove interest, the first step can be as simple as running a small, after-school tournament with a single console like a Nintendo Switch.
In this episode, I chat with ASEL co-founder, Shadi Hanna about this game-changing next step. We dive deep into ASEL's journey, the vision for its future, and how it's creating a space for students and teachers to thrive.
For all the teachers, principals, parents, and students out there, this episode is your ultimate guide to getting involved in the scholastic esports scene. Shadi breaks down the first steps to getting your school involved, from starting a casual club to building a competitive varsity team.
So, grab your pumpkin spice latte or cup of tea, get cozy in your favorite cardigan or sweater, and tune in to learn all about the latest in scholastic esports in Alberta! Find out more about the league at the official ASEL website and be sure to check out my previous conversations with Shadi Hanna and Travis Bouchard.
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Intro & Welcome Back
Cory: Wake up! Summer is ending or depending when you're hearing this, it's already over. For me, that means pumpkin spice lattes and cardigans. For students, that means new teachers, new classes and a fresh start with fall vibes. For student gamers across Alberta, it also means a new Scholastic League, a new way to compete, connect and represent your school. From NorQuest College in downtown Edmonton, this is Good Game Edmonton and I'm your host, Sellarcast.
Back on our third episode, you heard Shadi Hanna tell his story on this show, how gaming was an escape for him in high school that helped him find a community and eventually a career in esports. In January, you heard Travis Bouchard from Vimy Ridge Academy talk about the latest happenings and achievements for the school's esports program. Plus his involvement as vice chair as on the Alberta eSports Association's academic subcommittee in the creation of a provincial scholastic eSports league. Both awesome and informative conversations. And of course, I'm pleased to welcome back to the show Shadi Hanna.
Thanks again for joining me Shadi. It's so great to have you back on and I'm glad this time around we both have our voices. I mean, I'll probably lose my voice after this, but it's great to have you back on.
Shadi Hanna: That was quite the intro man, this is awesome. I'm super happy to be a part of this again and to check back in since we last left off. We've had a lot that's grown and lot that's changed. So looking forward to the discussion.
Cory: Awesome. Yeah, know it's great to have you back on. Yeah, and I know last we spoke, you, I think you had just moved to Calgary for Bow Valley College and you talked about obviously, know, teaching being that natural extension of coaching previously. So like now as an instructor in BVC's Esports Business Management Program, how, tell me about that transition. How's that been? What's been happening since we last spoke as you've kind of moved into that role at Bow Valley?
Shadi Hanna: It's been a lot of fun. I'm definitely very happy I made the transition. Calgary's been a great city and to be able to keep doing esports, and particularly at a college like Bow Valley, which has been so supportive of esports and the growth of the industry. Since we last spoke, we've opened our esports arena that would have been back in October. So we've got our, I think it's about 3,000 square foot facility on the second floor of the South Campus. It's a great space. 40 computers plus some console stations, fully equipped broadcast studio and a number of other you know really awesome amenities that we can offer for students for free at this time as well. During the semester this space is literally there's not an open seat in the house we have students that are there gaming recreationally practicing for varsity competitive matches for our new Bow Valley Bears esports team and so just to be able to be involved in that and to contribute to that and you know the few ways that I can as faculty has been really great and taking a lot of student leaders through my program and then seeing them pursue volunteer opportunities with our varsity esports team and supporting events in the esports arena has been really great. So just having the facility to be able to really engage with esports in such a unique and practical way has been really awesome to be a part of.
Cory: Absolutely, yeah, I that I haven't had a chance to go down there obviously yet, but seeing the photos, seeing people touring, checking out the space absolutely looks phenomenal. Obviously, you know, being here at Norquist College campus definitely feels like a battle of Alberta right now between you and I. So this is this is fun. This is cool. Definitely have to look at seeing getting into the space for a future episode or something. But yeah, I mean, for the real reason why we're, of course, here this time around since then, great to hear things are doing well for you. You haven't been able to sit still beyond the day job. So let's talk about the Alberta Scholastic Esports League. You're chair of the AESA Scholastic Subcommittee. Yeah, give me the details. What's the vision? What is it? Specifically, why now?
The ASEL's Journey to Independence
Shadi Hanna: So, you know, the last time we spoke, a lot of that discussion was around ways that I chose to get involved outside of what I was doing and how that was always the step to the next big thing. You know, it started with Esports Canada and then that led me to the Alberta Esports Association, which, you know, helped me find my way down to Ville Valley while I continued that. And, you know, this summer has been pretty awesome for several reasons. It's been the start of something new through a continuation of all of the previous efforts, but also actually a departure from ASA as well. And so with the Alberta Scholastic Esports League, we've now taken this project that we founded within ASA, this interscholastic competitive play network for students ages 10 through 18, attending middle and high schools across Alberta, giving them the opportunity to compete in esports. as a project that I led and commissioned through my role as the academic, the leader of the academic subcommittee and the academic development lead with the Alberta Esports Association. But as of January of this year, we've actually incorporated independently the Alberta Scholastic Esports League will carry on its own momentum going into the school year for 2025 and onward.
And so it's been really great to be able to do the work that I've been able to do with the Alberta Esports Association and connect with all these amazing teachers and educators from across the province that had previously been a little bit fragmented. There were a couple of different schools that had Esports programs, that had Esports teams, that might've even offered Esports classes. Some of them as early as 2021, just kind of on the tail end of COVID. But now actually connecting these people, connecting these voices and doing a little bit of thought sharing with all of the different schools that have some developed some expertise just from by nature of being involved in esports for so many years, bringing them all together, having their students, you know, giving their students the opportunity to compete against one another, but also to give those teachers and leaders the opportunity to help build something sustainable and something structured and something that, you know, hopefully can provide, you know, long-term benefits in the same way that you have scholastic sports and music and drama and all of these other amazing programs that we've been able to integrate into schools over time.
And so the Alberta Scholastic Esports League, as I mentioned, we're parting ways with AESA very mutually. We came to that decision mutually and saw it as being a benefit for both organizations. So now it's an opportunity for us to create our own identity with, very much in collaboration with teachers and administrators from across the province to build a scholastic esports network for Alberta.
Cory: Okay. No, that's exciting. Yeah, you took my next question in terms of obviously the separation between ASA and the Scholastic League separately. yeah, no, you mentioned in our last talk actually of how important it was to build that infrastructure in Alberta. So, you know, we don't have to play in those American leagues and such, and obviously all these other variables as well. you know, was creating ASEL, you know, as its own focus organization, a key part to that strategy that Made an Alberta strategy and even the Alberta Esports strategy that, you know, I think we all like to still kind of look to for any other guidance and going forward. But yeah, like curious to understand sort of that side of it too, now that you've incorporated as a separate entity.
Shadi Hanna: Yeah. 100% I mean definitely you know creating spaces for play is a core mandate not just of our organization but other organizations of national interest the biggest one being Esport Canada of course is kind of like our federal I shouldn't say federal but nationally leading non-profit that works in collaboration with a lot of the provincial partners as well as for example us as well as AESA in administering esports programming in each of our different regions. You know, the way that we've decided to separate and grow ourselves is very much in alignment with Esport Canada's vision for growth across all of the provinces. It's having representation in educational spaces, having representation in collegiate spaces, not just from a curricular perspective, but also from a competitive perspective as well. And building in spaces for collegiate pathways to pro and pipeline programs and so on and so forth. The third bucket being those recreational spaces. And so when we made the decision to part ways with AESA it was very much so that we could lean into the mandates of Esport Canada's EDU directive and to give AESA the space to really prioritize and focus in on some of those community rec and general professional play components as well.
You know there's a lot happening in esports not just in Canada but internationally that's very relevant to us and especially to our organization specifically and so we're just trying to figure out the best way that we can serve this one very distinct community and you know doing what we can to collaborate with others as they serve to meet different objectives and different aims and goals as we all build towards a more formalized and standardized structure for esports across Canada. So you know we definitely took a lot of inspiration from provinces like Ontario and Manitoba, which have had established scholastic esports associations for three to four years now, as well as several state-based organizations in the United States that do very similar things that are very focused specifically on K-12 and scholastic play. So that's kind of the background, context. At the end of the day, you know, to the kids, really doesn't matter what the name of the league is or who owns it or how they connect with others. They just want to play Valorant, which we're happy to provide and we're happy to offer the opportunity to do so. But very much all of this is about providing opportunities for kids to play, but also working towards something a little bit greater than ourselves. You know, we're at a stage now in the development of esports where we very much have the ability to think outside of our own provincial borders and how we can better connect with, collaborate, and ultimately identify ourselves to various key stakeholders across Canada and outside of our borders.
Cory: Yeah, no, 100%. 100%. No, that's good. Progress is happening. Nice to see things moving ahead well and activity. Activity's coming. Things are moving. Going back to your personal story again, as I alluded to at the top of the show in the intro, a big theme from your personal story was how games helped you overcome things like social anxiety and finding friends, which I believe, correct me if I'm wrong, but friends that you still have to this day. And so with the ASL mission, so many acronyms, tongue twisters, the mission emphasizes teamwork, sportsmanship. How will the league actively foster that sense of community so it's not just you know, about winning?
Fostering Community and Sportsmanship
Shadi Hanna: That's a really great question. I'll start with a quick note about your comment. It's funny that you mentioned the acronyms because when we were first trying to come up with names for our association, the first one that came to mind was Alberta Scholastic Esports Association. And then we're like, okay, so we're gonna leave AESA and then we're gonna form AC and just the email of just switching an E and an S and how much of a nightmare that would have been. Anyhow, was, funnily enough, that was probably three months of our branding discussion was figuring out how to position ourselves so that we don't just get confused with an AESA address when someone's trying to send an email. Yeah, there's a lot of... It is very confusing and it is a little complex from the outside in, but suffice it to say we're here to support schools. AESA is here to support others. And so in that supportive school, as to answer your question, how are we supporting students directly?
I mean, certainly my story is a huge inspiration for why the league exists and what we aim to do. You know, for me was gaming was a very essential component of my adolescence. It was a space for me to safely kind of discover myself and find things that inspired me and empowered me and as you mentioned so eloquently in your intro, it transformed from, you know, community to career. With the League, I think our hope is to be able to emulate that and the first method in which we can do that is by creating spaces where esports are accepted and even encouraged. one of the challenges that I had in my upbringing is that video gaming was very much not an okay thing to be doing. was a waste of time, it was distracting me from my other priorities, was, you know, the belief was is that the reason I wasn't making friends is because I was spending so much time gaming when, you know, really we know it was the inverse, right? And so a lot of the stigma around gaming and esports and people not really having a clear understanding of what it is and why it works and why it can be beneficial. And so by creating spaces for play, by working with teachers, working with educators, working with schools and administration to ensure that the infrastructure is being supported and as well that teachers are being educated and informed on how these programs work and how they can better support their students. I think ultimately a lot of that will lead to students feeling more comfortable to express themselves and to pursue things that are of interest to them and that make them feel safe and empowered at school.
You know, one of the cooler facts about Scholastic eSports is that it actually has a positive correlation with in-class attendance. Students that are previously disengaged from school when they have an activity that excites them and inspires them. And to be clear, this is not unique to esports. This is true of sport, this is true of art, this is true of robotics and whatever have you. But for that key group of students that wasn't previously being engaged with, these gamer kids that didn't really have anything for them at school, you know, when they start playing in these programs and they start showing up after school for practices and for games and you know they're talking with their friends at lunch about their favorite characters or whatever, it encourages attendance in school. It's a really awesome you know, trivia fact about esports programs is that they actually help to meet academic outcomes. And so very much, you know, an objective with the league, the first objective with the league is to create this space where students can play. There's some sort of standard and structure where they know what's expected of them, their teachers know what's expected of them, and there's a sense of accountability and commitment to this wider community of competitive players across the province and connecting them with each other.
You know, from that we do what we can to continue to support teachers as well. Because believe it or not, most high school teachers are not equipped to be professional esports coaches. So there's been quite a bit of training that's had to go into, you know, how do you take someone who, you know, knows a little bit about computers or maybe plays games casually and transform them into a coach, right? What does that actually look like? And so I'm very happy that as early as January of last year, actually just, just before our incorporation documents were signed, sealed and delivered, we were in Red Deer and worked on a coaching clinic with the Alberta Tech Leaders in Education where we had 57 teachers from across Alberta attend in person in Red Deer for a professional development session on esports and esports coaching. How to start your programs, how to set up your hardware and your networking, as well as game specific instruction to how to work with your teams and understand what your kids are doing when they're playing these games and to be able to give them some sort of sense of guidance and direction. you know, even if not at a professional level, but at least to know enough about what's going on and to start to recognize certain patterns of play and help encourage growth. Which was just one of the coolest things ever. You know, like we were worried we weren't gonna fill 20 seats and we tripled that. which is just absolutely absurd, especially considering the event was in person and not online, right? So it's just to see that amount of attendance, you know, and we're very thankful to Red Deer Public for hosting at the division office and allowing us to do that. And of course to the ATLE for helping us get the word out. You know, a couple of different ways that we're really trying to create structure and standards, I would say those are our two biggest things that we are doing right now to help students and to help teachers is just giving them a sense of what does esports actually look like and what should it look like and how can you start building it for your school.
Cory: Right, no, exactly. Yeah, no, just as a quick sidebar, I know you talk about attendance and wanting to come to class and show up and stuff. Similar things when I spoke to a few Norquesters as well here on campus. And just having the esports program was another reason why they weren't in a rush to get home. They were still hanging out on campus because of the esports program that was after school. So yeah, it definitely is a driver of student engagement at any level. you know, K to 12 post-secondary, we're seeing that, we're hearing it firsthand. So that's phenomenal to see the similarities that no matter the level of academics, you have that passion of people wanting to be involved and have that sense of community. They have a sense of belonging and... Yeah, they're showing up and it's good for everybody. It's a win-win scenario for everybody. So, yeah.
Shadi Hanna: There's a very prominent thought leader in the world of scholastic e-sports by the name of James O'Hagan, very, very recently presented on the same topic at the Serious Play Conference in Rochester, New York, about esports and self-determination theory. And to sum down, you know, and I hope he doesn't hear this and hear me butcher his explanation of it, but to sum it down very, very tightly and briefly, doing things that empower you and inspire you and things that are of interest to you helps you discover yourself and feel more confident in yourself. It doesn't matter what that thing is. so self-determination theory, like I said, it's not unique. This phenomenon is not unique to esports. But there's a very large group of students and a large group of people that are really into video games and are very connected to the stories and the narratives and the gameplay, even the strategies and the mechanics of these games that they play that, you know, gives them a sense of purpose and by being able to pursue that in a safe and supported environment helps them improve in all other aspects of their life.
You know, we have esports programs in this province that, you know, as of last year are mandating team workouts and exercises for their rosters and they're getting attendance at those sessions, right? We talk about gamers having a hard time touching grass. We have high school kids that are showing up to lift weights twice a week just so they can play on their school's Valorant team. That's happening in this province you know, already. And I think it really speaks to the power that esports has to, or esports have to motivate students to pursue excellence, not just in their gaming, but in all other aspects of their life. When they feel that they are encouraged and empowered at school and that they have a safe space to pursue the things that are of interest to them, you know, there's no telling how else they'll grow and mature in other ways as well.
Cory: 100%. Yeah, no, I appreciate that insight. Familiar with James, kind of listened a little bit to his podcast a while, a few years back now, actually. But yeah, no, great voice there. So I appreciate that insight. Coming back to the committee and your colleague there, your co-chair, Travis, of course, we had him on the show earlier this year. And again, he had mentioned the coaches clinic that was coming up at the time. But I mean, in terms of his case with his esports program, the first couple of years, he said it himself, the first couple of years were a little more difficult, obviously, to find competition. He was building, obviously, this incredible program at Vimy, but obviously was struggling to find other Alberta schools to play against. To me, I'm wondering, this sounds like, this new scholastic league is a direct response to problems like his for many schools across the province. So I'm curious, how much did stories like his factor in and fuel this creation of this league, you know, to get it done now?
Shadi Hanna: 100%. Yeah, I mean, I think it's safe to say that the Alberta Scholastic Esports League would not exist or certainly not, at least in this form at this time, without the contributions of Travis Bouchard. I mean, it really took people to spearhead initiatives in their own schools, in their own regions to even give us a leg to stand on when we go to other schools and say, hey, we want to let your kids play video games at school. Like for us to be able to do that, we have stories of success to build off of. you know, we've always known that it's good and beneficial, but it takes those those flag bearers to really kind of lead the charge. And so there's folks like Travis in Edmonton. There's folks like Jesse Sadlowski and John Thai and Koji in Lethbridge that have done a lot there. You know, there's schools in Fort McMurray that, you know, as of three, four years ago, we're hosting monthly Super Smash Brothers tournaments, with their school support in doing so, renting out their theaters and whatnot to broadcast them. And it took those leaders doing that in those spaces and legitimizing these programs for us to ever be able to get to this point where we can have a league and we can have you know over 75 80 schools in our network that are connecting with each other and starting to compete against one another.
Travis has always been very big on on intra provincial play and there's a couple reasons for this you know you know one of the unique aspects of esports is that you don't have to be physically in person to compete for the significant majority of titles and so you know there's there's been long-term discussions in the space about whether regional competitions are ultimately even necessary for the industry. Whether it matters to have Alberta versus Alberta if I can just as easily play someone in Manitoba or British Columbia or even Washington State if I wanted to, does does it matter? But one of the reasons we really push it in the scholastic space is for identity, is giving kids a better sense of where they stand. If you know the history of esports, before online networking and net play was really popular, esports happened in game shops. happened at comic book stores. It happened in people's garages, quite frankly, right? was like old school Super Smash Brothers Melee. And a lot of what really built to the creation of the e-sports industry as we know it today was those regional competitions and knowing who's the best in my block, who's the best in my city, who's the best in my state, and then eventually who's the best in my country. And so even though it's not matter from a technical perspective, it really does help to build a narrative and to get additional buy-in and investment from people when they feel like, you know, they can actually place themselves against other people kind of within their frame of reference, right? It's a lot more meaningful for a student from Edmonton to know that they beat a team from Calgary or from Red Deer or from Medicine Hat or whatever than it is, you know, we played some random team from Columbus, Ohio. I've never seen before. I've never heard of their school before and I don't know who their kids are. You know, you can do it, but it doesn't hold the same weight or the same meaning. Certainly from an operational perspective, it's also a lot easier for us to run a league that, you know, everything's in the same time zone and we have the same for the most part, the same school calendars. This province loves to have different start dates and end dates for every division under the sun. you know, I'm thinking about my calendar development process now as we just, we just finished our draft for our calendar a couple of weeks back. But it definitely does help to have those similarities. It's easier for us to communicate with each other and connect with each other. You know, we share the same language, so to speak. And so, you know, it's just it's a very natural progression or evolution of the esports industry is to have these formalized local, then provincial, and then ultimately national and international competition networks over time. And that pipeline from how do you go from being a kid from Sherwood Park to representing Canada at the Esports Olympics, which are going to be happening for the first time in 2027, right? How does that happen? And so we see ourselves as a necessary stepping stone in that pipeline forward.
How Schools Can Get Involved
Cory: Right? Yeah. that's exciting. Yeah, no, really interested to see how that first Olympics pans out. So, yeah, we'll see about that. As we further progress with the league and such, you know, for any teachers or principals that may be listening to this episode with yourself, many of whom I'm sure you've probably met. most of them, and teachers conventions, know, round tables, the Scholastic Subcommittee and other programs as well. But what's the first step to get their school involved? What's the first step?
Shadi Hanna: You know, it's a funny question because I wish there was a straight line answer, but there's so many different ways and methods in which people start to get involved in esports. When I talk about esports in schools, there's typically three different streams that we look at. There's the club casual community setting. There's like, you know, it's like after school kids are just, there's a Nintendo switch in an empty classroom and they're hanging out, they're playing, they're having fun. Or it could be things like watch parties, cosplay, et cetera. And that's usually where a lot of schools start because it's the lowest barrier for entry, right? It requires the least amount of structure and the least amount of standardization to get involved in. Where we focus most of our time with, of course, is the varsity competitive teams, right? And it's those schools that have, you know, infrastructure they've got, you know, at least three computers for Rocket League or five computers for Valorants or a couple consoles so they can fuel the Super Smash Brothers team. and they have a teacher that's dedicated, willing to oversee practices and games two to three times a week. And so that's where we spend most of our time is with that stream. And then of course, the third and final is curricular. And as I mentioned, there are already several schools in this province that are offering esports as an elective. I actually, in my role at Bow Valley, I had the opportunity to teach a school from Drumheller that was taking esports as a dual credit option with the college. And so those are kind of your big three streams.
Really at the end of the day, schools can choose to engage in esports in however they want to. If their goal is to compete with our league, that's where you're going to be looking at, making sure that you've purchased the required hardware, that your IT division has facilitated the proper networking and firewalls and all of the behind-the-scenes stuff that you don't really think about with esports, just to make sure that you get the infrastructure good to go and you can play without any service disruptions and what have you. And then of course finding your champion, your teacher or your EA or whoever it be in your community that will supervise and guide and support students in their competitive play seasons throughout the academic year. So that's the general gist of what esports looks like in schools and as I mentioned, we spend most of our time with those varsity teams that have those dedicated leads that are starting to, even if not at a very competitive or high ranking level, there's no requirement for you to be like a diamond ranked team in order to compete in the league, but you do have the infrastructure and you do have that point of contact that we can work with to facilitate schedules and matches and of course to provide whatever support we can to assist them in getting to the next level with their developing themselves as coaches and helping their players ultimately develop as competitors as well.
Cory: Right. Yeah, no, and that makes sense. And I guess quick follow up to that, because it just kind of occurred to me. forget if we covered this previously, but I guess in terms of this kind of workflow into the Scholastic League on a competitive component, for schools that haven't entered into esports yet, but really, they're not going to necessarily be quick to jump into it right away. They know they want to, they want to jump into it, but they're needing to kind of build up that case study to, for proof of concept to say, we want to do this, but you know, we need a little bit more, we need to do more homework to, to, you know, make our case on our end so that we can come to, you know, yourself and the team to get set up later on. But do you find that it's more so like maybe in those cases, a sense where you have that low barrier of drop in at the end of the day with a console in a classroom, and maybe there's already a champion teacher on staff that's sort of helping organize this as a starting point, and then that creates that case study, that proof of concept of interest that... There are students that we didn't even realize, oh yeah, if we upgraded, if we had something that was more competitive, we could make this work. We'd have teams, we'd have interest, and it wouldn't just be a one time only kind of thing. not just a drop in every Thursday. Do you see that as maybe, you know, something consistent that schools can consider first if they're needing to have that sort of proof of concept for administration or further up the chain. I know I think I've had a similar chat with Jesse in that sense down in Lethbridge, but nevertheless it was kind of maybe something along those lines that schools could at least get started with.
Shadi Hanna: Oh absolutely, right? And the reality is that in 2025, if you're talking to middle schoolers and high schoolers, there's a good chance that nine out of every 10 of them is gaming at home on a regular basis, right? So I would argue that I think we're past the proof of concept stage. I know that's a little bit naive in saying that. you know some schools definitely need to, especially when we're talking about budget dollars and allocating budget to e-sports infrastructure, you need a little bit more than that. But the proof is in the pudding. We had 250 students that attended the Alberta Esports Championship this year in Calgary. Our regional events, again in Calgary we had 70 students that showed up for our Super Smash Brothers tournament there. In smaller regions, anywhere between 20 to 30 students that participated in those localized regional events. If you build it, they will come, right? That's the reality of Esports. And so the first step for any school that still kind of needs to see it with their own eyes is just run a tournament. in most schools will either have a gaming device, like even if it's just like one Nintendo Switch. I was quite surprised to discover this, how many schools randomly just have like an Xbox or a PlayStation or a Nintendo Switch as kind of like a recreational activity for kids to do outside of classroom times. You know, if you have that one or two console devices and you can run a small tournament after school, get a sense of the attendance and the interest. You know, that's of course the easiest and the best place to start.
But even at this stage and especially with the things that we're doing with the Alberta Scholastic Esports League, you know, come to an event that we host and see it for yourself and see it with your own eyes what that interest looks like and that participation looks like and how many different kids from how many different places and schools and you know, I think very quickly it's not a matter of will this work but it's how quickly can we get this going, right? And starting to build that up. You know, it's very much been a bit of a domino effect in the province, right? And that's why I talked about those flag bearers, you know, those champion individuals earlier on. You know it took folks like Travis to get programs in Edmonton like at M.E. LaZerte or like at St. Francis Xavier and other schools in the region to start pushing into esports. It took Jesse and the Lathbridge school division team to get you know neighborhoods in Claresholm and Coaldale starting to think about and look at esports. And so I think it's it's only a matter of time before we see esports start to unfold in just about every school in the province. internally our 2030 goal is that there is an esports program in every middle and high school in Alberta by the end of 2030. That's our goal. And that program can be as small as one Nintendo Switch and one part-time, like one substitute teacher. It doesn't need to be a full-scale varsity program. We just want to see schools starting to explore. And it's up to them to really decide how much they want to continue to invest. You know, we're not going to kid ourselves into thinking that we want every school to become a high-performance academy for esports. You know you look at traditional sports and robotics and arts, and that's not the case anywhere, right? There's no school, there's no one school that is an expert in all of these areas, and not every school has, even offers these programs in every school. But we think that with just how prominent and prevalent esports are, how easy they are to get into, right? You just need that one device. You don't need to have a basketball court and maintain the air conditioning and the flooring and all of the other crazy things that go along with that kind of infrastructure. You just need a power outlet and a monitor and you can play, you know, Rocket League or Super Smash Brothers or Mario Kart and just have that space for kids to play. And, you know, we're quite confident that as schools start to explore that further, they'll see the value for themselves and hopefully continue to invest.
Cory: Yeah. that. No, I appreciate that. Thank you. You know, just want to shift gears for a sec here to something that I feel is on a lot of people's minds as we head back and head into September and back to school. We cannot ignore the possibility of a province wide teachers strike or lockout. Obviously teachers like you just alluded to, you know, they're the champions and key contacts for getting school programs like esports off the ground, how does that uncertainty impact this launch of the Scholastic eSports League? And what does kind of a contingency plan of sorts look like just to keep the momentum going this semester if the start of the school year this fall is disrupted?
Shadi Hanna: Yeah, I mean it's a great question and I'll start by saying that our organization is really ultimately led by teachers. I always say that my co-founder and I, Andrew, we're the rudder, not the wheel, when it comes to driving the growth of esports in this province. It's very much the teachers that serve on our advisory committee, that field rosters in our competitions, that dictate the growth of what eSports looks like. day without teachers this doesn't grow this doesn't happen and I would say that's a direct translation to our operational schedule as well which is you know if you know if and when we'll say a strike was to pass we would we would ultimately end up ceasing operations at least for the for the time being you know frankly because there's not much we can do, right? and traditional sports is the same, right? The AS2A is no stranger to this as well. When there are strikes, you don't have basketball that week because you don't have a coach, right? If you don't have a coach, you don't have a team, they can't play. And so the plain and simple answer is that if there's a strike we go on pause and we wait it out until everything's resolved and hopefully back to normal, back to better, we'll say, and then we continue from there.
Andrew and I are a little bit more agile in the sense that we're not ATA members ourselves. And so as far as planning, fundraising, and all of the business backend administrative things that need to happen for the league to operate, we can continue to work on those, but competition would have to cease until the teachers return to work. And so it's something that we've definitely discussed several times over the summer, the vote, was, I think was 94 % of ATA membership voted in favor of a strike. And that would have been back in, I believe, May or June. And so we've had several months to kind of think through and plan it out, but at the end of the day, our contingency plan is wait, wait, and then hopefully things resolve quickly and we can get back to letting kids play. But, you know, we have the utmost respect for teachers that are engaged in the bargaining process because as I mentioned, you know, they're the heart and soul of our organization. And so we do what we can to accommodate and to work around and to support and, you know, most importantly, to understand that sometimes things happen that are outside of our control and we just have to roll with the punches.
Cory: Exactly. Of course. Of course. No, no, I appreciate that. looking forward to seeing how the league materializes, this fall into next year and yeah, just looking forward to seeing the champions at the end of the day that are, are helping lead this, uh, going forward. So we'll, we'll see what happens, but nevertheless, looking forward to seeing, things kicking off this year for the Scholastic eSports League.
Shadi Hanna: Yeah, this is year one for us. Technically, year zero was last year, right? In the sense that we did operate in an unofficial capacity. We didn't have our branding. We didn't have our legal incorporated status. We were still running things through AESA. So we've had a year at this, but the biggest change to the schedule, and this is why the strike becomes a little bit more relevant for us now, is that we do intend to run seasons in both the fall and the winter. Where last year we had tournaments in the fall and leagues in the spring. This year we're hoping to basically have a full 10-month calendar of activity. With that there's some additional complications and challenges and yes of course the strike, the timing is right at kind of when we would begin to open registration or potentially that first week of competition depending on when that would come to pass. I'd like to think that because of, we've done this once through, we know a little bit about what we're doing a little bit better that once we're able to kind of get to work we can kind of smoothly just get back into the rhythm of things and have kids competing right away in time for season starting early October.
Cory: Right, no, 100%. Yeah, no, I guess a quick clarity check on the organization now going forward as its own entity. the subcommittee that was there under AESA, now that's the new advisory board. For me, it's just the technical terms, but for most people, it doesn't matter. But yeah, just curious about that structure, that new structure now for the org.
Shadi Hanna: Correct. Yeah, I mean, we try to make it as seamless as possible. So when AESA had this academic development portfolio, we basically just took that and transplanted it into its new organization. So very little has changed except for the names and the names, the emails and the colors is really all that's changed. And we did that because again, because we know how much confusion there is around all these different names and logos and acronyms and whatever, functionally for teachers and for students moving forward nothing changes. What changes is our legal standing and our relationship with governments and key stakeholders. Now when we approach government, we approach them as ASEL, not as AESA. And so now we're a new face that has to reintroduce ourselves and rebuild those relationships and connections. But to the students and teachers that participate, it's business as usual.
The Future of the Alberta Esports Championship
Cory: Right, yeah, I know. And for those who may not know, in terms of the advisory level with different representatives of teachers, those are teachers that represent different areas throughout the province. Are all those seats essentially filled at the moment? Like, quick breakdown on that component. For those who may not already know on who's contributing to this feedback as part of the scholastic league and other initiatives, of course.
Shadi Hanna: Correct. That's a great question. Yeah, that's a fantastic question. We took a lot of inspiration from how traditional athletics are operated in this province, partly because it's easier for people to understand when it's a format or structure that's familiar to them. And so the Alberta Scholastic Athletic Association, it's the ASAA, they follow a model. They have nine divisions across the province, eight of which are regional and one which is a Calgary independent. And so the province is actually broken down into six zones. This is per the College of Alberta School Superintendents, so high level scholastic administration. The province has been geographically segmented into six different zones. have your Northwestern with Grand Prairie, Northern with Fort McMurray, then trickling down South, Edmonton, Red Deer, Calgary, and then Lethbridge Medicine Hat. Those are like your big six. And then the ASAA adds an additional metropolitan zones for both Edmonton and Calgary, just because of how large those regions are. So you have Calgary and Edmonton Metro, and then Calgary and Edmonton, we'll say rural, like kind of at the outside exterior. The smaller cities and regions like Sherwood, Park and Strathmore and so on and so forth, the smaller townships.
And so our model currently, because we're just starting out, we've just gone with the original six per the CAS outlines. We definitely have discussed as we grow, eventually giving Calgary and Edmonton their own zone, the discussion for allowing charter schools and other independents to form their own leagues. As our needs and as our membership grows, who's to say what the future format and structure will look like. But that's the general gist is following along those kind of lines in the sand that have been drawn by the College of Alberta School superintendents. And so from each of those six zones, we have a representative that sits on our advisory committee that, essentially speaks to key issues within the league, whether it's format and structure, schedule, other initiatives that we want to take on. For example, you know, there's a big movement in the in the province right now for locally developed curriculum for esports. And so, you know, that's something that we, you know, when we start to discuss how we can support those initiatives, it's the advisory committee that advises us on how we can look at facilitating that. And so as of today, we have representatives from zones one, two, four, and five. And so that leaves Edmonton and Lethbridge currently vacant. I will say, however, for Edmonton region, I did have a fantastic conversation with a teacher just a few days ago and so you know hoping that we fill that seed and we're still kind of exploring for that southern region as well you know identifying that champion voice and so we put out a call within our kind of community the existing community that we have if any individuals were interested in self-nominating for those roles but yeah I mean if you know someone you know a teacher or an educator in your community and especially in those Edmonton or Lethbridge regions that is you know particular passionate about esports and engaged. We're always happy to meet people and always happy to have those discussions and bring experts into the fold so that we can ensure that every voice in every region is properly represented when we sit down to design what the future of the league will look like.
Cory: Fantastic. No, that's exciting. Awesome. Thanks for providing that info there, Shadi. Last time you were getting ready for, feels like forever ago, last time you were getting ready for the Alberta Esports Championship, we've now since had another one come through. first it was in Lethbridge. Just recently this year, it was in Calgary and your stomping grounds, of course. none other than at Bow Valley College. And obviously with Lethbridge, you know, the goal there alone was ambitious of having a thousand students. Travis mentioned, of course, his teams had great success there. You know, we witnessed obviously with the second one in Bow Valley back in January. Again, Travis mentioned that, you know, in the future, the championship might get to be a point where you have to qualify through your leagues before you can go to the championship. Is that the long-term vision for ASEL, you know, as this pipeline effect, so to speak?
Shadi Hanna: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, so as a good question as part of our we'll use the term acquisition because that's the legal appropriate term. As part of our acquisition of the ASEL name and brand, the Alberta Esports Championship comes along with that. so moving forward, we'll continue to operate and run that event as our penultimate event to culminate the academic year and the competitive calendar. so AEC will continue in 2026. We'll be running AEC again. And so, as you mentioned, this past year we hosted it at Boat Valley College. We selected that venue through an RFP process so we actually issued an RFP to over 48 recipients across Alberta. We were very pleased that we received 15 responses, some positive, some negative or chose not to submit a proposal. But we did actually receive a handful of proposals each from four different zones which was awesome. So we actually had four of the six zones represented in our proposals. We ultimately settled on Bow Valley just because of the facility there and what we were able to do in that space. But, you know, that's not to say that the championship is by any means bound to Calgary.
You know, we'll be opening up our RFP actually very soon here. We want to get it out a few months early. And so we'll be issuing that out again to those same recipients and a few additional ones as well. And we'll post information publicly when that goes out. So who knows where AAC 2026 will be. As far as what it will look like for this year, the committee, you know, and this is where I'm very grateful that we have this committee. Through our internal discussions we we've elected to continue to keep the AEC as open concept as logistically possible to ensure that as many schools and teams can be represented at the competition. I've always grown up a competitor. I grew up playing traditional sports— soccer, basketball, ball hockey. And so for me that idea of you know playing competitively and qualifying into a championship sports have been around for you know hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years and so that those systems are already in place where there's that expectation. But for esports, one of the things that we discovered through this process of hosting the event and collecting feedback and discussing with the committee is that for many schools, AEC is the justification for their existence. It's like we get to do this big thing and participate in this awesome event and provide kids with this amazing opportunity. And if we start to restrict that participation at this stage in our development, can actually have a little bit of an adverse effect. And so we've kind of settled on a middling ground where top performing teams in the league will get what we'll call priority registration and that will give them some extra time to get their ducks in a row before we open it up to the rest of the community but we'll still have that open registration period so that as many different schools can participate in an attend. And really the only limiting factor there is do we have the hardware to support you know hundreds upon hundreds of students. And that's ultimately the biggest challenge is that when you're running a two-day tournament and you're using the same 40 or 80 pcs depending you know whatever it is for for three or four different titles, it actually becomes quite challenging to run an effective tournament bracket. And so we do have to impose some limitations just because we want to make sure that kids can enjoy themselves and get enough games. And we budget time for tech issues because there are always tech issues and all of those things. Suffice it to say, if we had unlimited resources, we would have every student in Alberta attending AEC. But because we don't, we will determine our registration cap once we've kind identified our venue and close it like that, but we do want to make sure that those top performing teams in the league have the opportunity to represent themselves at the championship as an added incentive for their participation and competitive excellence in our league play.
Building the Broader Esports Ecosystem
Cory: Awesome, exciting. I'm got chills. There's just so much happening. And I will say, just because I'm biased, Edmonton has some nice venues. I'll just, I'll leave it at that. I can't do too much. I'm powerless, but.
Shadi Hanna: I'm excited for the day Edmonton Expo sends me an email with a proposal. I will happily receive that. There are some fantastic venues all across the province. But yeah, we do go to RFP. One, obviously, because of my relationship with Bow Valley College, we want to make sure that everyone has a fair fighting chance to participate. I actually recuse myself from the evaluation committee. So I don't even vote when it comes time to select the venue. That's the other core function of the advisory committee serves is that they're the ones that also review the proposals that tour the venues and then decide where. And so last year, Travis chaired that committee. So before anyone from Edmonton pipes up, it was an Edmontonian that told us we're going to Calgary. That's just the reality of the situation right now. I'd love to get to a point where we have all these different post-secondaries that are actively bidding on hosting this championship.
You one thing we didn't really get a chance to chat about was the current state of kind of the post-secondary market in Canada. You know, some recent changes to immigration have really affected colleges and particularly community colleges across Canada in terms of their recruitment. There's a much higher need now more than ever for Canadian post-secondaries to recruit domestic students. And AEC is an event where we bring 250 plus kids directly to your campus, directly to your facility, and it's an opportunity for you to recruit and to promote your programs. And so we've actually received some interest from a couple other post-secondaries that weren't in a position to submit a proposal last year that are intending to propose to host AEC 2026, one of which may be located in Edmonton. So who's to say? We don't know. But my hope is that as we continue to grow and as esports becomes more commonplace, every school is seeing this as an opportunity, one of the biggest recruitment opportunities of the year, right? Is to bring all of our student body to your campus to let them know about the programs you offer and to showcase your amenities and to give them a good time at that championship event.
Cory: Yeah, well, looking forward to seeing who ends up getting the host with the most for 2026 for the Alberta Esports Championship. You've mentioned post-secondary, actually, and that was actually my next question a little bit. But maybe we'll allude to it as well, obviously, student acquisition, of course. But in our first interview, you and I chatted, you had mentioned your ultimate goal was to create a better academic ecosystem for esports. With ASEL now established, obviously for the K-12 side, junior high, high school and all that, aside from obviously getting talent potentially on a post-secondary campus for an event or a tournament or a championship, besides that, obviously, what does this unlock for the post-secondary scene for Bow Valley, for Norquest College, Keyano, U of A, and others? You know, especially, obviously, whether they have an esports program or in your case, you know, teaching a specific program that's more on the business side. But nevertheless, you know, what is, what do you see this unlocking for the post-secondary scene?
Shadi Hanna: You know, I think the best answer to that is actually a point you made earlier, which was that students, you know, such as students at NorQuest are finding, are seeing the benefits of esports in real time for themselves. And so, you know, when we look at any non-academic programming in post-secondary spaces usually serves one of three purposes. It's to recruit new students, it's to improve the quality of student programming to retain existing students, or it's to help improve the institution's brand and image. That's cited as early as 1895 when college rowing first started to emerge. That's actually how college rowing became a formalized sport in the United States of America. It was those three factors that led to the development of the first organized rowing. I actually teach that in my esports class. If you want to learn about rowing, sign up for Esports Business Management at Bow Valley College.
This is a very long-standing belief and system behind why you do things that aren't just reading books and writing papers in college. Because if you think about it, it's just as, you know, crazy that you can go to college to play basketball as it is that you can go to college to play Valorant. Like what does that actually have to do with, you know, your academic pursuits? It's because we recognize there's all these additional benefits, not just the individual students, but to the institution as well. And so it's a mutually beneficial relationship and in traditional sports, even for the professional scene. Sorry, long winded answer, but all this to say, there's a number of different benefits that any non-academic programming serves. schools that have activated esports programs are already starting to see the benefits of that additional recruitment. They have a new market of students that are attending their school that may not have considered their school previously because of their extracurricular program offerings. You have students that are sticking around either for an additional year or sometimes even an additional diploma program so they can stay involved in their esports program. When I was a student back at St. Clair College in Windsor, Ontario, several of the students that I graduated, they enrolled in esports at the time because they didn't know what they wanted to do, discovered something they really loved while they were attending the college, went back for another diploma in marketing or financial management or whatever it is, and continued their involvement in the varsity esports program at the same time as they were doing that. What that means for students is a better sense of direction and purpose in what they want following their graduation. And for schools, that's another two years of tuition revenue. especially in this market. That's not something you can ignore. That's not something you can just disregard. It's incredible to have students that are so engaged in your community that they'll just complete one program and then will re-enroll in another. It's wild to think about. And so eSports can do that. There's branded components as well in being able to pursue sponsorship for your facility. Especially in Ontario where they're a little bit more established on the collegiate front. There's a number of schools now that have brought on some very big name partners and are building, you 10,000 square foot facilities like the one that Conestoga College is building out in Waterloo. And, you know, a lot of this is because of the relationships they've been able to build with their city, with their province and with industry, endemic and non-endemic, that just want to be a part of what it is that they're creating and building. And so the incentive for schools is there, you know, and I think in this province, as we grow, on the scholastic side and as our community grows and our numbers grow and we have you know we'll say a more compelling narrative to share with post-secondaries I think you know I'm quite hopeful that we'll start to see some more movements in a positive direction but yeah I'm always a little bit baffled when post-secondary institutions seem to overlook the very obvious benefits that esports programming can serve. And I think part of it might have to do with the way that it's being pitched or presented. There's certainly some startup costs associated with esports, and I think that's a lot of the time where those barriers for entry are again, there's so many case studies about the success stories of what esports has been able to do for post-secondary institutions of any size and scale across North America that I'm hoping only be a matter of time before more schools in Alberta start to take note.
Cory: I couldn't agree more. It's great to see. I mean, obviously here in Edmonton, I'm at NorQuest. It's great to see the esports program growing here. I'm just waiting for the other guys to follow, you know, and that's just in Edmonton. you know, hoping to see the development going. There's rumblings. I definitely know the needle is moving, but well, we're getting there. We're getting there. But I mean-
Shadi Hanna: Yeah, I will say. I will say to the credit of the institutions in Alberta that are doing esports, even though it's not a full varsity program level at a lot of these schools, as of this year, the University of Calgary, the University of Alberta, and the University of Lethbridge all have esports infrastructure on their campus. They all have dedicated gaming rooms that are either overseen by their intramural athletics department or actually by their student club. The U of C for example, have, it's the Calgary Esports Union, Students' Union that actually oversees the programming in that facility or historically has overseen the programming in that facility. So, you know, it's a step in the right direction, maybe not at the pace that esports is used to and at the pace that students would like. We'd love to see everyone in jerseys and getting land travel and scholarships and whatever just like all the D1 schools in the states are starting to do. But, you know, we're moving slowly but surely towards that.
Cory: Yeah. It's process. It's a process. Yeah. I mean, you make a good point, obviously, you know, whether you look at it academically or athletically, this Scholastic Esports League is truly this this new development pipeline that's forming in Alberta. How do you see it functioning as, you know, a training ground for others, you know, that want to get involved? whether it's during the K to 12 grades or post-secondary, rural, urban communities, know, obviously I'm kind of alluding more to, you know, other specific roles like casting, production, league admin and such. Obviously some on the post-secondary level, there's obviously certain programs that can sort of be a bridge to that. But yeah, I'm just curious, like, how do you see this sort of functioning so that you gain maybe not necessarily like part-time or paid staff, but at least volunteers, at the very least, and experience, you know, for people to get involved.
Shadi Hanna: Yeah, great question. The short answer is there's so many ways to get involved, even with our league alone. When we announce our official launch in the next few, I was going to say weeks, but I realized days, my goodness. In the next few days when we do our first soft launch, I'm not going to sleep tonight, I got stuff to do. When we do that, part of that launch will be communicating opportunities for volunteers. Things like tournament admins to help us run our online competitions, TOs to assist with our in-person Super Smash Brothers regional events, broadcast commentators, directors, gameplay observers, to help curate live streams and a variety of other ways through graphic design and marketing that we'd love to get students involved. We have a number of other ideas and initiatives that we're working on as well, but we'll be rolling those out over time. And you know, eventually one of our core organizational mandates is to offer part-time paid positions in the next few years. We don't have a date, a launch date for that yet. There's a couple of things that we need to iron out first. But for me, especially as someone that works full-time as an instructor in esports, job creation is a huge objective of mine. And so to be able to do that with this nonprofit organization and actually create opportunities for people to build real skills and to get paid to do it in esports is something I'm particularly passionate about. And so those are some of the things that we're working on.
Outside of that, even within your own school and community, I know schools that as early as middle school are broadcasting their matches and are letting students try their hand at some in-game commentary and whatnot. And so I do think this is an area of growth that us in Alberta, I think because of where we're at in our development stage, so much focus has been on just getting the infrastructure and getting the teams together to compete. That a lot of schools are still only just now starting to look at some of those outside of competition ways that students can get involved. But some definitely something that we keep in the back of our minds as well and you know as we continue to support programs in their development is looking at what we call Work Integrated Learning in Alberta. This is typically a very structured system especially at the post-secondary level where you'll take courses that have that actually have to meet certain standards for work integrated learning and classify as a will course or a will program. Some of those are paid. Most are are unpaid internship like activities. But they're they're they're methods by which you can you know engage in an activity and gain some hands on real world experience to help you in whatever your future career path is. And so actually in my work at Bow Valley one of the courses I teach is a capstone assignment where students have to pitch design and execute an esports event in the esports arena in collaboration with an industry partner. So that's a well-approved course. And so those are students that may not necessarily be competitors. And in fact, in my class, the significant majority aren't competitors, but as part of their graduation requirements, will be running an esports event, coordinating the broadcast, executing a marketing campaign, you know, doing the stakeholder management of working and collaborating with their industry partner to run an event that, you know, meets their needs and expectations. Esports is great at facilitating this is the point. There's career skills in esports you can so much and what's awesome is that a lot of them are transferable too. Like broadcasting skills are not necessarily unique to esports right the same skills that you learn in broadcasting can be applied to theater to film production to radio and other industries or podcasting you know who knows I might have a whole army of Cory's by the end of the semester who knows. So lots of lots of different skills that can be gained through esports context and settings and my hope is that as we as an organization with the Scholastic Esports League grow we'll be able to offer more of those and more we'll say lucrative opportunities as well over time.
Cory: Love it. Yeah. And I guess, you know, even an extension of that involvement too, I would imagine, you know, coming, having sort of the hand on the pulse of the innovation ecosystem here and probably the same thing in your case in Calgary, you know, entrepreneurs, you know, maybe if there's certain problems that you are sort of facing, if it's more of a tech solution, perhaps, you know, inviting entrepreneurs, even as early as student entrepreneurs, tackling projects. I guess you could we see that as being another another component of folks looking to get involved with the league and yourself.
Shadi Hanna: Absolutely. You know, I talk about the term entrepreneurship a lot in my classes because, you know, the common sense understanding of entrepreneurship is making a business to generate wealth is kind of how we define that. But at its core, entrepreneurship is about providing innovative solutions for complex problems. And it doesn't matter whether those are paid or unpaid, whether it's a new initiative or within an existing infrastructure or ecosystem. And so my argument is that any person that works in esports is an entrepreneur because we have so many complex problems and we need way more innovative solutions than what we currently have available. Esports changes overnight. What was it, just this week two of the largest professional esports organizations in the world sold off their assets and we're trying to figure out how do we make this industry at a competitive professional level more sustainable. How do you provide coaching services on mass or curated? How do you provide better networking infrastructure and servers for for games to actually be able to host their competitions at a high quality and to reach certain areas, things like game publishing and international markets. There's just a thousand different things that can be done with esports. And what we need is people that know how to look at a problem and see an opportunity, not a roadblock. And so, my very strong belief is that esports and entrepreneurship go hand in hand. And so when I teach my courses, that's very much at the heart of what I teach. And we're always looking for people that take initiative and are looking for ways to improve upon and build upon what we've been able to build with the league and find new ways to get involved or to help us level up the services that we currently offer.
Cory: Yeah. the entrepreneurship component I really resonate with and it's nice to hear that connection of it going hand in hand with with esports, and so looking forward to seeing what surfaces from that, whether it's, you know, from a post-secondary level with, with student entrepreneurs or even just seasonal entrepreneurs that are out in the space looking to solve a new problem. And, you know, in this case being associated with, with video games, with, with esports and helping being part of something that's being built as we speak here, really exciting. And there clearly is a lot more to do. And it'd be great to have more, I think, passionate folks, especially on the entrepreneurial side, to aid you guys to help build stuff, to make it as efficient as possible. Obviously, we'll incorporate AI at some point or another. But yeah, no, no, really exciting. As far as anything else, like I've asked everything I would like to you, Shadi. Is there anything else you'd love to add that we haven't hit.
Final Thoughts & How to Connect
Shadi Hanna: We've been quite thorough. I would say, you know, to leave with the final notes, you know, at our official launch upcoming here, and then mentioned in the next few days and then following the strike as well, we're hoping to do a more official, you know, press run and everything, you know, anything that you can do or, you know, as a listener to support getting the word out to people in your network that you think may be able to assist or might be interested in some of the things we're doing. you know, always can appreciate that, that additional boost in getting the word out. Of course, as I mentioned, there's, you know, so many different ways to get involved, whether it be as a volunteer and supporting the execution of our leagues as a sponsor for, to help us fund our operations or support our operations throughout the academic year. If you're interested in hosting our championship event, you know, submitting a proposal in response to our RFP as well, you know, well, and we'll make sure that details of all of that go out on all of our channels. Once we launch, you know, ASEL, Esports on pretty much every platform and then our website www.asel.gg will be our new version of the site. You can actually go online right now and you'll see a little one page work in progress page right now but when we officially launch we'll have at that link www.asel.gg we'll have some more information there as well about how you can support or at the very least reach out and learn a little bit more.
Cory: I found it! Awesome. It's truly incredible to see this come together for esports in Alberta and especially in the scholastic side of things here. So bravo to you Shadi, to Travis and the entire advisory committee here for ASEL and just really appreciate the hard work you all are doing and the dedication of making this happen and not, you know, not letting it go by the wayside. So really kudos to all of you for leading this going forward. You once told me that if you don't know where esports lives in Edmonton, it's probably, or I guess anywhere else for that matter, it's probably because you haven't taken the time to look. And I'd say this seems like only a natural thing where you're making it nearly impossible to miss, especially here in Alberta.
Shadi Hanna: that's the goal, Corey. We're going to be in your radios, on your television, on your Instagram feed, wherever we can be. Because we think we have a really important message to share, which is that kids all around the province deserve the opportunities to engage in activities that are meaningful to them and empowering to them. And we want to be able to continue to offer that to as many students as we can. Hopefully, if you haven't heard of us yet, now you know a little bit more. And soon we'll become big and too big that it will be impossible to ignore. That's the goal. So, you know.
Cory: Love it, love it. And obviously to reiterate again, Shadi, for all the teachers, staff, parents, students who are now, they haven't already been, are officially hyped by now, I would hope, to get involved again, just to reiterate, where is the best place again for them to sign up, get involved, or just to get more info and just tag along for the ride as you get going here.
Shadi Hanna: I'm so excited I get to do this. You can visit us at our website at www.asel.gg. Yeah, go check us out. Like I said, with our official launch, we'll have all our social media platforms. be on, I believe we picked Instagram, LinkedIn, as kind of being our two predominant ones, and then by extension, Facebook, YouTube, Twitch, and some of the others as well. So we'll be in a couple different places and try to have some cool content for your feeds as well. So definitely make sure to Like follow and subscribe. Is that what that what youtubers do? Yeah. Yeah, hit the bell down below notifications. Yeah, perfect. Awesome Yeah, point everywhere fell here. Look over there. Yeah, whatever. Awesome. Cool great.
Cory: I think so, yeah. Yeah. No, I'll be sure to connect with you afterwards just to make sure we got all the links for the show notes and of course for the show's website as well here for the for the episode. Shadi, thank you again for the time and just for this monumental effort you're putting into scholastic esports in Alberta. Thank you so much.
Shadi Hanna: Thank you for having me, Corey. It was a pleasure to chat with you, as always.
Cory: Well, once again, if you haven't already figured it out, everything there is to know about the Alberta Scholastic Esports League, head over to asel.gg. Shadi, I got that right, right? Yeah, yeah. I got the nod, got the thumbs up. Yeah, we're good to go. Of course, for all the latest episodes of this show, including this particular episode, you can catch them all at Good Game, Y-E-G. And of course if you enjoyed my conversation with Shadi, comment, like, or share this episode with your friends, colleagues, and network. And of course, like Shadi said earlier, hit that subscribe button wherever you listen to podcasts. Every action counts. Much appreciated. Sellarcast out.
