Age doesn’t matter in pursuing the education and career you truly love for our hardworking student, Jeric Batarina. This 27 year old lad is currently taking a Bachelor of Science in Entertainment and Multimedia Computing at CIIT College of Arts and Technology. Jeric is a brave course shifter who started off his College journey on a different path but later decided to align his passion in video gaming into something worthwhile. So, he left his former school and enrolled in CIIT’s EMC program. Today, he is not only a student but also a scholar and a year away from graduating! Take a look at Jeric’s portfolio here.
Why did you choose to study your current program?
Because I wanted to know more about how videogames are created.
How and where did your passion for video games started?
I was inspired by the game developers of the video games that I played. Since I have a bit of background in Computer Science from my previous university, I decided to give it a shot on making my own.
How did you get to know about CIIT?
I actually came from another university before entering CIIT. A year before I enrolled in CIIT, I spent most of my time at home playing video games. One of my English teachers in High School noticed my situation at that time and persuaded me to continue studying. This time, suggesting that I should take a course that I would love the most. Since I do love playing video games, I’m curious on how they are created. So, I decided to take a course on game development.
I, then, started searching for a school that teaches GameDev. I went first to the website of the Game Developers Association of Philippines(GDAP) then searched for their partner schools, then voila! I saw CIIT on the list of schools offering a very affordable game development course.
How did you become a CIIT scholar?
Before the pandemic, I was a student assistant in our library. I was working in order to afford my school’s tuition fees.
When I was in my first year, my parents told me that despite the affordable school fees, they might not be able to sustain paying up for it, and I might be forced to stop if they can no longer do so. That time, I met a student assistant working for the library. After becoming friends with him (for almost 4 years now!), he suggested that I become a student assistant. Fortunately, I was also a student assistant in my previous university’s library so I applied.
What is the most remarkable experience so far in school?
It’s definitely the school’s Sportsfest! Specifically, the one we had back when I was in first year. Though I’m only a participant in my team’s cheer competition, I really felt the camaraderie with my team. That event also had a lot of fun and memorable moments. Despite the competition, I still had fun in the end.
What can you tell about your class experience and the curriculum of your program?
The curriculum for my course is one of the most versatile, since it teaches us not only to program games, but also how to design them from the ground up. The school also taught us how to create our own assets, from sound to 2D sprites and even 3D models!
Tell us about the culture
“Diverse” is perhaps the best term I could describe about CIIT. There are lots of people with different backgrounds and passion, and they reflect in our schools’ variety of organizations. Whether you want to further your hobbies or want to be friends with people of the same feather, all it takes is a simple “Hi”.
Describe to us your Instructors
While there are times that our instructors would be strict to us, especially in the classroom, most of them are approachable, even friendly to the point that they’d give you life advice!
