Closing the College-to-Career Gap: College Esports’ Impact

[Tom Leonard] 

I'm Tom Leonard, I'm the host of the Gamers Change Lives podcast, where we talk about how esports can create jobs around the world. Play games, create jobs, change lives. In Season One, we talked about jobs. In season two, we called it “Follow the Money”. We talked about investment, we talked about sponsorship. And then in Season Three, we're talking more about how to build a business, the kinds of things that everyone can do to help them grow, get started and maybe grow. Now, today, I'm really, really happy to have a guest here, Donna Walters from Sacramento. Welcome, Donna.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Thank you so much, Tom. It is so great to be here. I just love doing podcasts because it's really fun and exciting to spread the knowledge of esports and gaming, especially when it comes to education.

[Tom Leonard] 

Great. Two questions right off the top. Who is that beside you?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

So this is Pepe, he is a little World of Warcraft parrot that pops up, non-playable character, right, NPC, and he's my companion.So he keeps me company on all these calls and through meetings and yeah, he's my companion.

[Tom Leonard] 

Great, great. Now, I mean, like, this is an audio podcast, so people can't see it, see him necessarily, but it's always, it always makes it a little more interesting. The other thing I wanted to ask you is about, what's “basic tag”? What's the story there?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

So it's kind of lengthy, but I'll go into it here. So I'm terrible at creating names for things. So like names for projects, names for products, names for, you know, just doesn't really matter, including nicknames and nicknames for myself especially. And when you're a gamer,

you have to create a bunch of different nicknames just all over the place in all the different game accounts. And so when I first started gaming, I had no idea what I wanted to call myself.

And I was thinking about it. My girlfriend invited me to go out bowling with a few of her friends. We all decided that we were, well, they decided, I should say, that they were gonna come up with some fun, silly names and I was panicking. And so they went through

their list of names and it got to me and they said, “Donna, what are you gonna call yourself?” And I'm looking around, I'm like, I don't know, Takedo, and it was the first thing I saw and it was Takedo's. And so I said, okay, I'm gonna call myself Takedo. Well, When you're gaming, sometimes you have to do those shout outs or those call outs and you don't have a lot of time to

say the full name to keto. So it got shortened to tack. And so all my friends started calling me tack. And fast forward, as you can see, or the viewers can't or the listeners can't see, but as

you can see, I have my, my bun. I love my North face. I love my Starbucks, you know, all the basic, you know, stuff, right? So I'm kind of basic. And my best friend was teasing me one day and said, “Oh my gosh, Donna, you're so basic.” I said, “You know what, I'm gonna own that. So I stuck ‘basic’ right in front of ‘taq’. So now I am ‘basic_taq’ in my games.

[Tom Leonard] 

Great, great. There's always a story. No one's like, I don't know where it came from. It's like, no, there's, so I always, I've been using the one “Tomasi Dakoli” because

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Oh, okay, so tell me yours.

[Tom Leonard] 

The reason that I use that is because in Fijian it means “Tom the dog”. And one of the things I realized, no one, I never have a problem of someone else having the same name. So

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

I can understand that. I can see how that would…

[Tom Leonard] 

It's always handy

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Hehehe.

[Tom Leonard] 

Now you're in Sacramento, right?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

I am. I am located here in sunny Sacramento, California.

[Tom Leonard] 

Could you describe, because one of the things that we've been doing this season is kind of giving a little geography lesson for people around the world, because we talked to someone in Cleveland. We talked to, you know, everyone kind of thinks that everything happens in New York or L.A. So can you tell us a little bit more about Sacramento? Because the other thing is I have really good memories of Sacramento. I used to work at a computer manufacturer up there years and years ago, and I used to live at the Hilton Hotel there in Sacramento. And I really like Sacramento. So could you tell people a little bit about Sacramento?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yes, absolutely. So we are in the western area of the United States located here. It is the capital of California and we have a bunch of, you know, it's really kind of a small downtown Sacramento area. I feel like, I mean, your tall buildings are not what you would consider like San Francisco or New York City or, you know, even LA, right? where we have several tall buildings, but really they're kind of smaller. So we are unique in that aspect that our downtown area is just a hop, skip, and then jump away from historical old town Sacramento. And old town Sacramento is a great place, especially if you have the opportunity to come and visit. Check it out, do some tourism. They have the horse drawn carriage rides, the brick streets, you know, the old, you know, 100 year old buildings, the railroad and train museum. I mean, there's so many different wonderful things that you could see, but the thing I love the most about Sacramento is that we are about two hours from a completely different climate in any direction that you go, right? So you can go south, you can go west and then go to the ocean, you can go north and go see the redwoods, you can go. east and start heading towards the desert, right? And there's just so many different areas that you can go to within. However, California is absolutely the largest state and driving from Northern California to Southern California will take you about 10-ish on average hours. So people oftentimes when they're coming to California or if they're talking about California, they don't realize how far Sacramento is from LA, for example.

So that's another thing that I really like to look at is, oh yeah, the state's a lot bigger than people probably expect it to be. And so if you wanna get from Northern California to Southern California, take an airplane.

[Tom Leonard]

Yeah, because even so, here from Burbank to Sacramento, it's like an hour and 15 minutes or so on the plane. I mean, so…

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yes.

[Tom Leonard] 

It's like, it is spread out. Well, people a lot of times, and I don't mean this to be a geography lesson here, but a lot of times people don't necessarily understand how big the United States is

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yes.

[Tom Leonard]

Or conceptualize it, just how far things can be. The other thing I wanted to ask about here upfront is, I noticed in your LinkedIn profile, you have an IMDB link.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

I do.

[Tom Leonard]

Can you explain because that's the maybe the first time I've come across an esports profile with an IMDB link and I'm a huge IMDB fan. Could you describe a little bit what IMDB is and why are you there?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Sure, so “Internet Movie Database” is what IMDB stands for. And it really categorizes anybody that works in film or TV shows or has some kind of a TV, like an internet TV show presence. And some of my work, I have my hands on all different pots, right? And so I don't just focus on e-sports and education and connecting students with career paths and opportunities, but I also work as a producer slash talent or host for an internet TV show and local cable show called GPU the show, which is Game Players United. And what we do is we go to various events. COVID put a damper on some of our progress. However, we're still out there. We're still going to different things. We report essentially on everything that's gaming related, mostly here in the Sacramento or Northern California kind of region. And we go to different events, interview players, interview game developers. I mean, there's a whole bunch of different folks that we get to meet, talk to, better understand the space. And then it gets broadcasted either online through our YouTube channel or through our local cable television channel and network. And so that has awarded me the opportunity to be hosted or featured on IMDB.

[Tom Leonard]

Yes, yes. And I think one of the great things about that story is for people to think about how else can I be talking to the world? And a lot of times people think I've got to be on TikTok. That's my window to the world. And it's like, no, there's a lot of other places to be out there. I always ask this, what got you into eSports? What got you into gaming?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

That's a great question. I've been a gamer all of my life and started with the traditional super NES consoles and Nintendo, right? And Super Mario Brothers and Duck Hunt. I love Duck Hunt. And all the fun stuff, right? And so I started off with that but didn't really consider myself a quote unquote gamer at that point. And it wasn't until my first round of college that I was going to in San Diego when I had been living with a couple of folks. We were roommates. and they were super hardcore PC gamers. And I didn't really know that PC gaming was a real big thing. I thought it was just mostly, you know, Nintendo consoles, right? Sega Genesis at that time, et cetera. And so it was interesting because they would spend, and remind you, we're in San Diego, California, and beautiful beaches, beautiful weather. You've got all the different sports teams.

[Tom Leonard]

The best, the best.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yeah, everything, everything is there for the taking. So I'm constantly asking my friends or my roommates, “Hey, you know, let's go to the Chargers football game or let's go to the beach.” And I would always, you know, get the same response, which is, “Oh, no, I'm gaming.” And I'm like, “What? What do you mean? You're gaming.” And they would be on their PCs for about six to eight hours at any given point in time. And I just non-judgmental. But I was like, I've got to understand. I've got to know what it is exactly that they're doing, because it's got to be amazing if it's capturing their attention for so long. So I sat in, I asked them, I said, “Well, what are you guys doing? Oh, we're gaming, we're doing this.” They're playing Team Fortress 2. So that became the love of my life, if you will, my first love. And I even have a little, I don't know if you can see it, but a Pyro, framed Pyro picture here, which is a character in Team Fortress 2. And that's the character I used to love to play. And so I started getting into that and they said, “Donna, you need your own PC.” We went down to Fry's Electronics, which was the local electronics store at the time, got all the computer parts, and then I actually, with their help, of course, built my first gaming rig.

[Tom Leonard] 

Wow!

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

And

[Tom Leonard] 

Wow!

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Yeah, it's

[Tom Leonard] 

That's

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] Pretty

[Tom Leonard] 

Impressive.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Cool. Thank you, thank you. Yeah, I couldn't have done it without their help, trust me. It was very much, it was all them. So we, and I built every PC that I've gamed with ever since. So it's been a really cool thing. So I started gaming hundreds of hours in Team Fortress 2. I did a little bit of Half-Life, Portal 2, you know, some of our, or Portal and Portal 2, and some of all of those, the games that fit in the orange box, right? So that was a lot of fun. And then I decided that I wanted to continue on. I really love first-person shooters. So, Battlefield franchise was one of my favorites, definitely Overwatch. As you can see, I dabbled into World of Warcraft a little bit. Don't necessarily love the game itself, like, the aspects of it. I'm not really a big MMORPG player. I enjoy the world, but what I love inside of World of Warcraft the most, believe it or not, is like fishing. So that is my favorite part. But when it comes to first person shooters, you know, I just love it. And I play multiplayer games so that way I can socialize and have fun. And actually, you know, my first Team Fortress 2 server that I really belong to, I helped start build up and then ended up getting this huge community together and people that came in every single night regularly. Pretty soon our server filled up. We started having waitlists and that's where I met my best friend who I'm still friends with today. And so now he and I actually get together in real life regularly and hang out. So that's my gaming history. That's how I started gaming.

[Tom Leonard] 

So many, we hear that story so often that it's like, people have merged their online and offline relationships out there, which is what makes it worthwhile. What to start here talking about, in particular, I noticed you work with college esports, a nonprofit out there. Can you describe what it is that they do in particular and what you do there?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Absolutely. So I actually founded College Esports. And like you said, it is a nonprofit organization. And I am the executive director currently. We are really focused on building innovative workforce environments, really, and connecting students and future leaders with opportunities to build their careers. So for example, I work with a large team of multiple schools in various systems, various districts and help them through with after school programs. I work with a professional esports organization, Gen G, on building their K through 12 after school programs. So it's not limited just to college. It's really scholastic esports as a whole. And we, you know, focus on what career paths are available and how you can get there. And so that's kind of the main focus that we have. I also onboard interns work with various schools to get those internships either paid for credit. or just as volunteers based on what the qualifying school is able to do. And then we send folks out into the workforce with a whole portfolio of skills and abilities that they've acquired through either their time with the student clubs and organizations, through their time with our nonprofit, or just by connecting them with other folks in the industry.

[Tom Leonard] 

Could you talk about that in a little bit more detail? Because one of the things I really like hearing is people. We talked to Nick Turner and the team in the UK, and they were talking, you know, we got lucky and got control of a group that is a team there in the UK and they are all these guys. They were still in school, but there's this, this break between, okay, I'm in school and I'm doing all these great things in eSports. Now I got to get a job. How do I take what I learned in eSports? and translate it into a job. And it sounds like you have some experience on how that works. So how does that work?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Absolutely. So just first before I really kind of address that part, just to take a step back and look at the whole ecosystem as a whole, right? So we're looking at when it comes to education, the whole goal of education, especially higher education, is to prepare students for the workforce. And one of the challenges that I've noticed is that a lot of times students will graduate college with their degree in hand. ready to get a job, and then there's a six month to a one year waiting period before they actually land one. And so I said, okay, my passions are create positive workplace environments, and then also to support our future leaders for success. And so I came in there and I said, I have a solution. I can help reduce that college-to-career gap. And that originally started with me going back to university. I was a much older  student, so they called me a non-traditional student, just to be nice, I guess.

And I'm not the same age as the average college student. And so I was trying to figure out where I wanted to go, how I fit into the whole collegiate ecosystem as a whole without even esports gaming involved. And I was playing Overwatch with one of my friends, and he ended up going to or he was going to a university in Texas and played for his Overwatch team in Texas. And that's how I found out about college. or collegiate esports, I should say. Well, I decided to then reach out to my on-campus gaming group. There were 15 CSGO players. And I said, “Well, hey, where do you guys wanna take this club?” And they said, “Well, we wanna make this UC Irvine level.” So if you don't know, UC Irvine is one of the first four-year public universities to implement an e-sports program. And so I said, “Well, I have a background in community association management. That was my first life. So I had about 10 to 15 years of community association management, working with boards of directors, building up community, all that fun stuff. I just really enjoy it. And I can get us there.

And so the club president at the time said, “Yeah, absolutely. Let's work together. So we implemented some policies and procedures that actually ended up resulting in exponential  growth. So we grew from those 15 members to a Discord community of over 350, 400 people within about two semesters. So huge growth. From there, we attracted the attention of Big Sky Conference, which is our varsity athletic conference that the university's football team plays in. They asked us to implement their inaugural season and implement e-sports through the conference. And so I helped them put together a presentation they pitched to all the university presidents within the conference. If I remember correctly, the university presidents voted unanimously in favor of bringing e-sports to the conference. And there it was. It was born. And from there,

[Tom Leonard]

Just, just if

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

yeah.

[Tom Leonard]

I, let me there up to you for

just a second there,

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Sure.

[Tom Leonard]

because Big Sky, is Wyoming included

in that?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

I don't know off the top of my head. I'll be perfectly

[Tom Leonard]

University

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

honest

[Tom Leonard]

where I'm

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

with

[Tom Leonard]

because

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

you.

[Tom Leonard] 

I was doing that's where I went to school years and years ago

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Okay.

[Tom Leonard] 

And what was interesting in doing a little research in the past was what they've been doing in esports. And what I noticed was the conference and it  may be the big sky Maybe another

one because they change all the time But it  was like the conference was really picking up the ball and running with it And I thought that was really impressive. So now i'm kind of understanding where they're getting that push from

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Absolutely. Well, and not only that, but then traditional sports as well, from what I understand, has recently been declining when it comes to viewership and participation. And so, you know, part of that, I think, is I'm hearing, I don't know how true this is, but I'm hearing part of it's because the pressure from the parents on the students has become so great, the students kind of don't really want to participate. And then also, simultaneously, esports has really started climbing and expanding. And this is really where we can meet students where they are. They are already playing video games. They're already on the computer. Technology is huge. You have to know technology and really understand it to survive in this world at this point with a career. And so meeting the students where they are is a great movement by Big Sky Conference to adopt esports. And just to clarify, it's not put on or governed by the NCAA. Some people think it is, but it is not. And so which I think is a good thing. 

[Tom Leonard]

Could you describe what the NCAA is and what role it plays in sports here in the US?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Absolutely. So that’s the National Collegiate Athletics Association. So basically they are the governing body for traditional sports in the higher education system. And there's also a, like for junior colleges, there's another version for junior colleges as well. And so we, you know, Big Sky Conference and a lot of these, you know, conferences that you hear from, they're all part of the NCAA. And the NCAA just governs everything. The rules, the regulations, that's when you start  seeing certain legislation pop up and saying, OK, you need to have something like Title IX, for example. You need to have all male teams and equal number of all female teams or equal number of players. And so they're  trying to really put a bunch of rules and regulations in the place. But some of those things don't really work for esports. And that's why I feel like maybe the NCAA isn't the best option to govern esports. In addition to other things, for example, game publishers own the title for the video games.

[Tom Leonard] 

Yes.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

So traditional sports, you don't have that same thing, right? So it just doesn't make sense for the NCAA to govern esports. Does that help?

[Tom Leonard]

No, I thought that was a really positive thing. I remember in the past when the NCAA was not going to be involved in esports. It's like, you know, dodged a bullet there because the NCAA is unbelievably powerful. I mean, you have to give them credit. I mean, college sports is a huge money making operation in the U.S. for media rights. And I don't. And I'm just not sure it would be there without the NCAA. So, I mean, it's not like they're doing bad things or anything but they're also very much in control of things. So I think that's probably a good thing.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Absolutely, especially when it comes to certain restrictions that they have. So, for example, like I said, the reason why we're seeing all male teams and then all female teams is because the NCAA has those restrictions, you need to have that balance. However, when it comes to esports, we have a lot of co-ed teams. And so you have a lot of males and females that are on one team. And under NCAA guidelines, that just wouldn't work out. And so we really want to make sure that we're allowing different genders, you know, to really make this inclusive space when it comes to esports and gaming. And so that's another one of the reasons why the NCAA may not necessarily be the best fit, because they really segregate instead of integrating. The other part too is that the NCAA just recently passed a rule, or they changed their rules, saying that they now are, or student athletes are now able to get paid for their image and likeness. Whereas that was not available before.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Well, we are the fifth largest global economy, right? And then we're also the entertainment capital of the world, technology capital of the world. So it just really makes sense for esports to grow here. However, on that note, we're actually behind, believe it or not. So very interesting. I looked up Big Sky Conference. It looks like it is not part of the Big Sky Conference. We have Eastern Washington, Idaho. Montana, Northern Arizona, Colorado, Portland, Sacramento State, and then Weber State.

[Tom Leonard] 

Got it, got it. Yeah, they change all the time. Hey, I wanna talk a little bit here about, one of the things I saw, you have a really good article out there on LinkedIn that I'm gonna link to, where you're talking about how e-sports led to major growth in student leadership at Cal State. The key word that I liked there was leadership. And what you're saying there, a couple of things that you say in there, is college esports launches are a lot like startup businesses.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Absolutely.

[Tom Leonard] 

And also simply put, programs need specialists from multiple fields to work together for successful results, which is one of the stories that we keep telling over and over here. You need people from all kinds of directions. But can you talk about student leadership?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

100%. So one of the areas or one of the larger brands that we attracted during our journey is the California State Fair. They reached out to me and they said, we would love you to help us set up our inaugural Bear Cup tournament. So I did. So I worked with them. I brought in a bunch of student volunteers. So they were able to get some experience there, get some credit for there's certain clubs on our campus. that require a certain amount of volunteer hours, and so they were able to help fulfill some of those hours. And so we were getting a lot of that. Well, we noticed that there was such a huge interest and students were really stepping outside of their comfort zone, just so they can participate in the esports activities that I found this as a huge motivator. And so I started bringing together all 23 of the California State University esports communities into a single Discord server. And I started working with the CSU, the California  State University's Chancellor office that governs or oversees the entire system and really helped to pitch some ideas of how the Chancellor's office can support esports system-wide. And while they were kind of listening and hearing and trying to figure things out, I was working with the students on the student leadership from various student groups on the campuses to form and execute a tournament and a league that was a California state-specific league. And so what we did was we looked at four cornerstones or what I like to refer to as the four cornerstones of college esports, which is community, competition, education and careers, and then entertainment. And so within each of those, I formed kind of like the student government type of environment where you would have student leaders that were heading up each of those areas. And then a president that would kind of help guide and support. each of those leaders. So five student leaders in total that were heading up pretty much everything. And what we would do is we would take a range of students from different degree paths and backgrounds. So not just IT, but we're looking at business students, folks that are interested in marketing, people that are interested in art and design, people that are interested in health and wellness. So all these different avenues coming together to put on a league and execute tournaments. Well, as you know, when it comes to executing tournaments, it's very much like executing the Super Bowl. You need people to market. You need people to come up with graphics to create that marketing material. You need social media managers to post. You need people that are actually gonna run the tournament brackets and the tournament itself. You need the players. And so there's so many different elements that are involved and these students started gaining real world experiences going through things like effective communication. time management, how to juggle the workload of work, school, and their volunteer work with the Cal State Esports Collective. You know, all of this all together and it really amounted to such extreme success that the Chancellor's Office loved our pitch, loved the ideas, loved the motivation from the students, that they decided to actually take what we were doing and implement it as their own. And so now they have constructed a full support for esports system-wide for the California State University system with our help. We developed a website. Together we launched a couple of what we call “unconferences”. So they're not full scale conferences, but they're more geared at, sorry, aimed at people that are interested in gaming and esports. And from there, that just kind of took off and it led me to understand, okay, students really need one to reduce that college to career gap. And then they need these opportunities, these hands-on learning opportunities to either get their foot in the door for esports careers or just to build on what they're already  interested in. And so you wouldn't think, or people that are outside of gaming wouldn't think that health and wellness can be integrated as a career in esports, but it absolutely can. We're looking at gaming-related injuries, head and, or not head, but neck and shoulder and lower back and carpal tunnel and all that. Those are all injuries that people see in the office environment, easily translates over to esports and gaming as well. And then not only that, but then we also promote things with students like, make sure you eat the right foods, make sure you get enough sleep, make sure you drink water, right? Try to stay away from the energy drinks because they can really spike certain levels of anxiety. And we take all those different elements, we utilize that, we train our students. Not only it's a very comprehensive holistic approach, So not only in their career paths, but personal wellness, mental health wellness, physical wellness. We also look at things that they're interested in and match them to various projects that they're interested in. I mean, it's a whole world of just experience that they just couldn't gain on their college campuses that they're gaining with us.

[Tom Leonard] 

Yes, yes. No, it's so great to hear just all kinds of opportunities there. I always think of here where I live in Burbank It's like right in the middle of the entertainment world they do a lot of film they film a lot of TV shows across the street at a middle school and What happens is I was talking to a kid up the street one day and he was like he's in the AV club at that school. With this, you know ABC show comes over here to film the AV Club gets to work with people

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Yeah!

[Tom Leonard]

you know, that are doing a real television show, you know, with real budgets out there and just the kind of experience they get. And so many of the things that you're talking about there. One of the things I want to talk about for a little bit is money, because you're talking about a lot of different things that I'm always interested in. How do you fund these kinds of things?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

So as a nonprofit organization, we are able to receive grants. So a lot of government grants go into this at this point in time, because we are a startup, if you will. So I have been in the educational esports space for the past probably about five years now.

[Tom Leonard]

Long long time.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

However, the nonprofit just launched technically, officially. Launched meaning I filed with the state of California as an entity about one year ago. And so our organization is a very new startup organization And so we are doing a lot of you know volunteer work at this point in time. I don't earn a salary. This is all passion for me for right now. However, we do apply for various grants. We apply and we connect with other folks that are in our space to offer these opportunities. And so once we do get some of those opportunities that present themselves through the grant funding, then we're able to extend the financial opportunities to our students who are then participating. And so really it's a collaboration there. We also work with a couple of other areas. I like to have a wide portfolio.

.

[Tom Leonard] 

And what kinds of grants, what kinds of organizations, what kind of nonprofits,what kind of foundations are out there that want to be, that are interested in hearing about esports? How do you get their attention?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

So I really work with a lot of schools first and foremost because that's the educational component. And I show them because at first a lot of people will say, I go to many events and I talk to a lot of people. I am also a speaker that I'll go on to,

[Tom Leonard]

I'll quit interrupting, but that is something if you don't get anything else out of this conversation, you say that you go to a lot of events and you talk to a lot of people. That's the bottom line here. That's the way to make things happen. Sorry to interrupt.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

No, you're good. I love networking. I could talk forever. I told you that before. So feel free to interrupt. But I love networking. I love meeting new people. I love, I'm a connector personally, outside of my role with college esports, but I am a connector and I love to find out what people are passionate about. And then as I'm talking to these different folks, I start, you know, collecting a kind of a database in my mind. And I say to myself, oh my gosh, these people have this certain goal. this person has this certain goal, I can totally connect the two, and then everybody's happy, right? And then I feel good because I'm connecting folks and doing good in the world. And then other people are feeling good because they're getting opportunities or they're getting their needs filled. It's just great. So yes, absolutely. Go to events, network, talk to people, all that fun stuff.

[Tom Leonard] 

So, we were talking about grants and did you have other sources of income that you were talking about?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Yeah, so what I do is I talk to a lot of schools, administrators, and people introduce me to other folks that are looking to get more information on esports. But oftentimes I like to explain, you know, the career opportunities and the social development opportunities that are out there, especially for middle schoolers, high schoolers. And people will tap into me and say, hey, you know, we saw that you did this project over here. Can you do something like that for us? And so I do get leads when it comes to various projects. And then I'll go and I'll work that. For example, I recently worked over the summertime, a summer high school institute, where I would teach two different sessions of two weeks, seven hours per day about esports and career development, and then throw in some gameplay there too. Because that's what the students want. They wanna be able to play their favorite games. And if we can teach them something along the way, absolutely, win-win for everybody. Everybody's happy. So that was really cool. And then other opportunities, I spread the portfolio, the financial portfolio out. So we do things like, for example, sponsorship, or we'll do fundraisers, or we do podcasts like this, for example, right? And there's a workshop that I'm gonna be teaching coming up here pretty soon. So it's a diverse financial portfolio. And then we also have a couple other things in the works that I can't release the information about that yet, however, know that it is something that the space really needs, and it's gonna be just tremendously good for the space, especially to help. navigate or help people who are not endemic to esports, better understand and navigate which organizations are the ones that they wanna work with and which ones that maybe are not really quite fitting their goals and vision. So that's all I can say on that part. But yes, we also work with elected officials and various cities, and then we bring like community enhancement projects to those cities, and that gives additional in-person opportunities for our students to gain. those additional hands-on experiences.

[Tom Leonard] 

What I hear you saying is you're looking for money everywhere.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Absolutely.

[Tom Leonard] 

And so it's like, and no shame in that. I mean, the people who succeed are the ones that are looking. And the other thing I hear you talking about is you're thinking outside the box. It's not just like, we've got to nail these grants down because we don't have these grants. Okay, we want these grants, but then we also want to talk to these people, these institutions and so on.

Also want to talk, oh, you're talking about sponsorship. There. Could you talk a little bit more about sponsorship and who would be a good sponsor and how do you land them?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

That's probably a whole other podcast on itself, but I can try to simmer it down just a little bit. And I do want to make it very clear. Our organization is 100% for the people. We are not out to make a billion dollars. We're not out to get rich. We do need funds in order to sustain. So that way it drives the space forward, but really, we're not in this to make money. We're in this for the community. So I just want to make that very clear, because not everybody is, right? And so to answer your question though, as far as funding goes and sponsorship, really we've taken folks that are, we've received sponsorship dollars from folks that are either endemic to the esports and gaming spaces, or even people that are not, and that are like, hey, what is that? That's kind of interesting. Yeah, sure, I want to contribute to student success, and here's some sponsorship dollars, right? But a lot of times you're going to see, technology companies, computer part, computer peripherals, computer components, you know, a lot of those companies that will come in. There's, you know, Microsoft, Best Buy, Dell, you know, those are all large organizations. And really, it's all about that relationship building and seeing what you can do to help others. At least that's what's been successful for us. Like I said, I'm a connector. I want to see how we can help other people succeed. And just naturally, that helps to form that relationship. And so then when our students need something or our students are looking for something, those are the people that I can reach out to and say, hey, we already have this established relationship and I know you're doing great things in this space. We're aligned with our values and our goals. How would you feel about supporting some student success in these areas? And that usually, it brings the opportunities to the table. And not only that, I'm never hard set. I shouldn't say never, cause never is never. I'm almost always open to negotiating what the terms and conditions are. And that's really important, especially in esports, because we are still in, I don't know, maybe not the infancy stages anymore, but definitely in like toddler stages, if you will, because there's so many different organizations that are out there doing all these different things. People are kind of recreating the wheel, and I am seeing that happen. And so my goal is to bring everybody together, but it takes time. So there's different avenues that you can go and, you know, we're all talking basically to the same people. You're going to run into the same folks, the same faces, the same names, you know, whenever you go to these events. So definitely, if you're listening to this podcast, I'm sure you will. You want to make sure that you're not burning bridges. That's the number one, number one piece of advice I can give you. Don't burn bridges. You know, do your best not to, right? Treat people fairly with respect. Be kind, be courteous. You know, don't scram. crew people over, it shouldn't be said, but unfortunately, sometimes it has to be, you know, so that's what's really gonna get you ahead. Good, honest business practices, effective communication, and that's how you land those deals.

[Tom Leonard] 

What I also hear you talk about is the long term.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yes.

[Tom Leonard] 

So, and the networking and the relationships, it's like, you know, this conversation, no one's gonna, they're not gonna write me a check at the end of this conversation.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Exactly.

[Tom Leonard] 

But I'm not here for that. I'm here because of the long term. And that's the other thing that we keep preaching here over and over again is think long term. And that's what, burning the bridges. I mean, that's exactly it. If this doesn't work out, that's great. There might be something in the future. I wanted to talk a little bit here about underrepresented communities.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yes.

[Tom Leonard] 

That you are probably working with there. Why is that important?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Well, I mean, if you're coming at it from an organization development standpoint, right?Research-based and scientific-based, all that stuff, it really just naturally makes sense. So regardless of what industry you're in, regardless if you're in a small group setting or if you're in a large group setting, studies have really shown, as well as my own experience, that groups actually operate better when they have diverse opinions and diverse mindsets and ways of thought coming in to solve a single solution or a single problem. And so that is so incredibly important to not only e-ports, but our society as a whole. Let's open up those conversations. Let's lay everything out on the table. What are all of the challenges? And then if you have one singular way of thinking, then you're not going to meet everybody's needs. You're only going to partially meet, not even fully meet, but partially meet the needs of the people that share a similar mindset. So in order to really open the floodgates and really make the most impact that you can possibly make, you really need to have diverse perspectives. And so get it from the bottom up, the top down, however you wanna put it. For example, one thing I like to really emphasize when I speak to administrators and faculty and staff, they are not the experts. They are not experts when it comes to eSports and gaming. Your students are the experts when it comes to esports and gaming.

[Tom Leonard] 

Exactly

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

And they're the ones that really, yeah, they know the ins and outs, they know what the norms, the expectations, the culture, all of that. And if you are an administrator or faculty or a staff member trying to run and operate an eSports program, make sure that you get the student perspective highly involved. Don't just say, oh, they're just students. I can't tell you how many times that's happened. How many times I've seen it and I've heard it. Oh, they don't know anything, they're just students. So it's like, no, they're the experts. Yeah, and so administrators, faculty and staff are the experts when it comes to, you know, best business practices. Best business practices or the ways to get things done. They're the ones that have that expanded network and the students can learn from them. So really it needs to be very reciprocal. And that's a great example of how diverse or diverse thought process is really can help benefit and create a whole, a whole product.

[Tom Leonard] 

Our last guest on season two was Jeremy Utley from the Stanford Design School, the D School. And he had a book called Idea Flow. And this is exactly the premise of this book, which I read it and I said, hey, I want to talk to him, you know, which when you have a podcast, you can ask anyone. But that's exactly, he said, what you need to do if you're going to have more ideas, everyone needs more ideas to be successful. But the way you get ideas, going to the same people with the same background as you, you're not going to get any other perspective out there. So that what you're saying is exactly what he is saying in his book. It's you need those diverse backgrounds, ideas.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

100%, 100%. And not only that, but you could also utilize your position with creating these esports programs as a way to help society as a whole. So let's say, for example, there's a huge equitability gap when it comes to technology. Not everybody has access to technology. Therefore, not everybody's able to play video games like I'm able to play video games, right? And so that's one of those things that I'm really passionate about is how do we help reduce that equitability gap. And there is a strong, and I'm sure you know this, but there's a strong difference between equitable access and equal access. And I see this graphic that floats around from time to time, but I love it because it really defines it or shows, depicts the meaning very clearly, where let's say for example, you have three different people that are three different heights. Somebody at five foot, somebody at six foot, and somebody at five five. and they're all trying to look over this fence. Well, maybe only the six foot person can look over and the other two can't. And if you were to give them all equal height and blocks that they all stand up on, well, they're still at different levels of being able to see. Maybe the five, five person can see over the fence now, but maybe the five foot person still can't. But if you're making it equitable, then what you're doing is you're giving each of those people blocks based on what their needs are.: So that way they can all see over the fence. And if you're developing and designing an esports program on a college campus or a school campus, K through 12, let's say, think about equitability, not equality. Because how can we make sure that some of our underrepresented students have those same career opportunities as some people that come from maybe privileged backgrounds. And so that all kind of builds into it as well.

[Tom Leonard] 

No, that makes a lot of sense. One of the things I want to talk about here, don't want to spend the whole day, your whole day here. But one of the things that I, just in having this conversation, one of the things that I hear, you're able to think big and look at a lot of different opportunities out there. Because what I hear you talking about is, in the different organizations that you found and that you work with and that you presented to, it's like, you're the kind of person who's out there thinking. big thinking of, not just big,: but it's like, how else can we do this sort of thing? And what I want to know is, do you have any ideas, any thoughts on how other people can develop more of that mindset? Because I think a lot of people, and it also goes back to, we were talking not on the podcast, but Reginald and I were talking to a guy in Africa who he was, he was working with farmers and who did... who could use technology to improve their access to markets.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Yes.

[Tom Leonard] 

But they didn't have smartphones. So his approach, I mean, most of us would be like, okay, how can we get them smartphones? And he was like, no, they all have feature phones, which are phones without screens, which we had in the past. So his idea was, how can I use the tools that they have to do what it is that will help them out. And I just wanted to see from you, it's like, how can people develop more of the mindset that you're talking about? Because it's really easy to describe, but it's not something that everyone can do, and maybe there's not a perfect solution. How would someone do that?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

It can be very difficult. I'm not going to lie. So I feel very fortunate because that's kind of my superpower is I happen to think very creatively and outside of the box. And I look to solutions that maybe other people are not necessarily haven't really met yet or practicing yet. And I really look for ways that we can accomplish as many people's goals as humanly possible. You can never make everybody happy, but we can always try to make that gets in the way is ego. And really taking a look at yourself as a person, introspection, right? And I'm a big advocate for therapy as well. I think that therapy is absolutely wonderful as long as it's kind of like dating though, right? You want to make sure you find the right therapist that matches you or else it's just not going to be a good fit and it's not going to work well for you. But, you know, really taking that opportunity, maybe even working with a therapist to find out, you know, what makes you tick, find out who you really are, find out what your insecurities are, find out why maybe you're closed off to certain ideas. And what I see oftentimes is a lot of people, especially people in higher positions, you know, not the highest ones, I see a lot of really great minds that are very open-minded in the highest positions. And that's probably what's propelled them to that space. But I see maybe middle management is a really good one. They have to fight tooth and nail to kind of get where they are and fight to get to be heard. But then what ends up happening is that because they're still kind of getting their footing, if you will, oftentimes I see a lot of folks that maybe get insecure with their capabilities or insecure with their position and really want to do a good job. And so their heart might be in the right place, but that: fear and that ego of, I don't want to look bad. sometimes gets in the way, right? Or maybe they've been bullied, you know, for most of their life. And maybe, you know, they've been treated poorly as they're climbing that ladder, and now they're in a position of power and they're saying, oh, finally I can do to others what's been done to me. So really looking at that ego and thinking to yourself, “Okay, do I really need to do that? No, I really don't.” I don't need to step on other people to be successful. So. What can I do first and foremost to be happy with myself and then fulfilled with myself and confident in myself and my capabilities? And then once I think once you can really get a handle on that, it's gonna allow you that freedom and flexibility and comfort to now open your mind to other people's ideas and no longer think to yourself, well, if they're winning that means I'm losing. No, that's not the case. I really firmly believe in the whole idea of with the tide. All boats rise, right? Let's help each other out. We don't need to step on each other to get ahead. There's enough business out there for everybody. Let's just work together and help grow. So that's my advice is really take a good hard look at yourself, find out where your insecurities are coming from, and then try to work on that. And then that way you can gain that confidence to be open and receptive to other people's ideas.

[Tom Leonard]

Great, great, great advice. Great advice. And I think one of the one of the advantages that people have in esports is that, well, first of all, it's based on playing games. So it's if it's not fun, you're doing it. You're doing it wrong. So I mean, it's just like, you know, if you're if you're a chartered accountant, it's like, you know, it's going to be a little hard to in my opinion, to make that fun. I suppose it is for some people. But but here, you know, here we have games. So we should always. I think, you know, always look back at that. The other thing that I hear you keep talking about is community.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Yes.

[Tom Leonard]

And could you give like maybe two or three ways in general that you, advice that you would give someone, because community comes in all kinds of different flavors, as you've been describing really well, because it comes, you know, within a game, within a team, within an organization. And everyone needs a community to be successful.

[Tom Leonard]

And again, I know what you're going to start out here. It's hard work.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

It is.

[Tom Leonard]

But could you describe maybe just give people advice on how do you build a community?

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Absolutely. And it is some of the hardest work. It really is.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

You know, people are definitely we're all very unique. And, you know, we all come from different perspectives. I often like to think to myself, first and foremost, as I'm developing a community, that there is no such thing as common sense, specifically because we all come from different backgrounds. We all come from different experiences. I may have traveled to certain places. that somebody else could only dream of or maybe has never even heard of. And so my experiences are not gonna be the same as that person, even though maybe we ended up in the same location. So first and foremost, you know, remove any idea that common sense exists. The second thing would be make sure that you're really focusing on effective communication. There's a couple of games that I really like to utilize to help with that. One of them is that it's a PC game, but I think it's cross-platform now, but it's called Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes. It is a great exercise that people can use for effective communication and building that effective communication skills. So you're looking at, you know, coming from an open mind to help build community, you're looking at effective communication, but then you're really focusing on if you want to make a very successful community, that's thriving and that's positive, because remember my passion is building positive communities. That positivity is so critical because if people can feel safe, they can do so much more with what they're given than when people are feeling like they're constantly having to CYA, right? Or like cover their butts, right? For other people from being backstabbed or whatever else the case is. And so, you know, looking at creating those internally or emotionally safe environments. So to do that, we're looking at making sure that you're creating spaces where people can feel like they can be themselves without being harshly criticized or talked down to. We have a hard stance against any kind of racism, sexism, any other isms that you can have out there. If you participate or engage in that, you're gone. Like we don't we don't tolerate that in any way, shape or form. And not only that, but then certain areas that people don't think about when they're building communities and they say, how do we build this inclusive community? We want to see maybe more women gamers or female gamers in this space or female identifying gamers in this space. How do we do that? And then I look at what they're offering and their gaming area is a very male designed kind of layout, you know, sharp angles and edges. you know, there's, you know, certain colors and, you know, lots of reds and blacks. And not to say: that that's not cool. That's totally cool. However, that doesn't necessarily always speak to the female personality, right, or the feminine ego.

And so, you know, looking at maybe providing more gender, gender neutral spaces, as opposed to more male dominant spaces or female dominant spaces, but maybe more gender neutral, because then you're capturing all audiences, your males, your females, your non-binary or third gender. You know, people are now saying, oh, okay, this is a space that I can identify with. You're also looking at things like the jersey cuts. A lot of jerseys or clothing that you're seeing out there that are advertised for sale or even things that the players are wearing, they're very male cut or what we call now straight cut as opposed to slim fit. And when we're saying slim fit, that's generally reserved for more of the feminine type of body and shape, right? And so when you have those different types of fits. And I refer to them specifically as straight cut or slim fit because it's not male or female jerseys. It's, you know, what if you're non-binary? What do you, then which jersey do you pick, right? You pick the cut. And that's really what it's based off of. So if you can provide things like that and you can attract players in a gender neutral type of environment, that's automatically subconsciously gonna make them feel more included. So that all of those different tips and tricks amongst, you know, a ton of other things. I mean, again, another full podcast worth, right?

[Tom Leonard]

Yeah, exactly. No, because if we can only make people start asking more questions, then we've done our job here.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Right. And not only that, but then you know, you're thinking too, okay, well, now this is also an educational system. So I really like to when I'm building community, I like to we just talked about this and you just had your guest on look from all different perspectives. Let me get everybody's voice included. I want to hear not only from the administrators, but the students. And I also want to hear from their parents. I want to hear from community leaders, because those are the people that are hiring our students. What do you want to see? What skills do you want to see your child or your future employee have? And then fitting that all together. And then the effective communication piece comes with relaying that information to each of those parties based on what that audience needs to hear. When you're creating a community in, let's say in colleges at that level out there, how do you build engagement? I really talk to them. I go from a servant leadership and a democratic leadership type of approach, right? So servant leadership would be basically, as I'm sure you know, but maybe some of the viewers or the listeners don't. So servant leadership is really aimed at removing roadblocks, right? So I'm not telling students what to do, per se. I mean, we have our rules and our regulations and guidelines. These are some of the expectations. I very clearly, effectively communicate what those expectations and the outcomes are. I also open it up in a democratic style, meaning that everybody gets to kind of have their say. Everybody gets to express if they like the idea, if they have concerns with the idea, they're expected to bring ideas to the table that they would like to see based on, you know, what their on-campus community is asking for or wanting, right? And so that really helps us to keep a better idea and understanding as to how they're going to engage. Because if they're telling me, this is what I want, I'm absolutely going to try to get that to them. And there are limitations,: of course. We were talking before about limitations, especially financial limitations. When it comes to higher education spaces, depending on if you're a public institution or a private institution, depends on your cash flow. How much money do you have to work with? How much space is available? So that's where it comes in with the educators and, hey, educators, what are you looking for? And then that way we can engage them. And then we start bridging that gap or building those bridges, if you will, between the students and the leadership and saying, hey, students, we want to get you these gaming spaces under these certain conditions that you are saying you want. In order for us to do that, the administrators need to see x, y, and z kind of results in order to be able to prove that this is a worthy investment. And so then we start working together and bringing everybody together. Now the students have a goal, and they understand what that goal is. And the administrators are getting that goal achieved, not by their work, because they're already slammed but by the work of those students. And then it's a natural fit, and it really helps. So that really helps engage the students by, one, bringing their ideas together, right? Two, showing them and reassuring them that they have a voice that's actually impacting what we're doing on the table. And then three, we reiterate what their impact is. Hey, you asked for this, this is how it's looking. We are doing this for you. So yeah, that's how we engage the students.

[Tom Leonard] 

That sounds great. That sounds great. Hey, we need to wrap up here. OK, or I can just keep talking about these things because I think you have a very interesting story for people to hear about, not necessarily how to create an esports program at, you know, UC California, but in general, a kind of more of an approach to how to think how to think about things. So, hey, you know, really, really appreciate your time here to talk about community, talk about engagement, talk about fundraising, talk about everything else. But I think the most important thing here is just the outlook, the how do you, and I think what the word you used, I think, defines it most is how to be creative out there.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Yes.

[Tom Leonard]

So Donna, thanks for your time. Really appreciate it.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Tom, thank you so much. It's been a pleasure and we have definitely more information on our website, which is https://collegeesports.gg. All one word, no dashes, no crazy uppercase letters, just all one word, collegeesports.gg. And you can see a list of various career opportunities there and internship opportunities as well. So go ahead and check us out.

[Tom Leonard]

Great, great. We'll put some links in the show notes as well. So

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters] 

Fantastic.

[Tom Leonard]

So to the audience, thanks for listening to the Gamers Change Lives podcast. Play games, create jobs, change lives. Thanks again, Donna.

[Donna "BasicTaq" Walters]

Thank you so much, Tom.