Co-organized by the Taipei City-based university, CWC is the first student competition in the world combing e-sport and mathematics. More than 2,000 undergraduate and graduate students from 45 countries and territories vied for cash prizes totaling NT$70,000 (US$2,164).
Among these, 36 players from Taiwan, Indonesia, Russia, Ukraine and mainland China were invited to compete, with those from NTU, Institut Teknologi Bandung from Indonesia and Xiamen University from mainland China making the final round.
Staged on the PaGamO online education platform, the competition tested contestants’ problem-solving skills and gaming strategies. It was broadcast on live video streaming platforms Livehouse and Twitch, and attracted more than half a million views.
Benson Yeh, an NTU professor of electrical engineering, said CWC builds on the success of PaGamO, the world’s first multiplayer social platform that allows students to learn class materials while gaming online.
“The competition provides a great opportunity for the world to appreciate how the flipped learning approach is reshaping Taiwan, and how such education innovation can be promoted to the world,” he said.
Incorporating gaming in education will make the learning process more interesting, Yeh said, adding that he does not rule out the possibility of hosting more similar games and involving younger students.
Invented by Yeh himself, PaGamO was one of the two overall winners of the 2014 Wharton-QS Stars Reimagine Education Awards, seen by some as the Oscars of innovation in higher education. (SFC-JSM)
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