How Esports Is Entering the Academic Mainstream in Colombia
In our conversation, Mario Agudelo , university professor, esports educator, Team Manager for Colombia, and CEO of Gamers Society Esports explained how he has helped structure esports across universities, schools, and public initiatives in Colombia. His work spans university teaching, youth development, curriculum design, talent identification, and national-level ecosystem building.
Mario teaches esports at two universities in Bogotá. In both, he has developed the structure in two complementary ways:
The first is practical: building an esports culture for students who already play. That means organizing training sessions and teaching students to improve how they approach performance. Instead of repeating the same habits every day, they are taught to think differently about training, recovery, mindset, nutrition, and discipline.
The second is academic: creating a semester-long esports industry class. Students learn how different game genres function, how training varies across titles, and how the business and management side of esports works. Mario’s model shows that esports in Colombian universities can become both a practice and a field of study.
An esports curriculum starts with deconstructing performance. One of the most valuable ideas from the interview was Mario’s methodology for teaching esports. Rather than treating esports as one undefined activity, he breaks each title or genre down into four structures:
1. Technical structure
This is the core skill layer. In MOBAs, for example, students need to understand farming, movement, mechanics, and in-game economy. In shooters, it becomes aim, crosshair placement, and mobility.
2. Tactical structure
Once basic execution is understood, students move into rotations, macro play, objectives, communication, and decision-making.
3. Physical structure
This is where Mario challenges one of the biggest misconceptions in gaming: that physical conditioning is irrelevant. His programs include physical training because long sessions require strength, posture, endurance, and fatigue management.
4. Emotional structure
Students also learn the life skills each genre demands. In team titles, that may mean leadership, teamwork, and assertive communication. In fighters, it may mean emotional regulation and creativity. The point is clear: esports performance is never purely mechanical.
Why parents support esports when the process is explained properly
A major barrier to studying esports in Colombia and LATAM is parent's perception. He explained that the first step is helping parents understand that esports is not simply wasted time in front of a screen. It can be a structured developmental environment that builds habits, discipline, communication, and emotional growth.
But what makes the difference, according to him, is the format. Mario strongly believes in physical learning spaces. He has found that students behave differently when they train in person rather than online. They communicate more, build relationships more naturally, become more open emotionally, and engage more seriously with the process. Instead of watching their child isolated at home for six or seven hours, they see them in a structured environment with peers, routines, conversation, and guidance. That creates trust.
This is an important point for anyone building esports programs, if you want long-term support from families, you need visible structure. Universities take esports seriously when they see the numbers. Mario also shared how he gets universities to buy into esports. The starting point is simple: show them how many students are already playing. Once institutions realize that more students may be playing esports than participating in some traditional sports, the conversation changes. What first looked like a niche interest starts to look like a real student activity category that deserves investment.
From there, the next step is to show that esports can be trained and taught with the same seriousness as traditional sports. When university leaders see a semester structure, training methodology, space requirements, and educational outcomes, esports becomes much easier for them to understand. This is a critical lesson for the growth of esports in universities across Latin America: institutions are more likely to engage when esports is presented as an organized system.
Esports education creates career visibility beyond playing
One of the strongest parts of Mario’s model is that it does not frame esports only as a route for players. He explained how esports ecosystem classes can open students’ eyes across different disciplines. Law students can start thinking about legal careers in esports. Architects can consider how their work connects to gaming spaces and event infrastructure. Designers, sociologists, and business students can all begin to see where the industry may overlap with their own profession.
The future of esports in Colombia also depends on government structure. The interview went beyond education and into national development. Mario discussed Colombia’s process of recognizing esports more formally within a sports framework. In his view, government recognition matters because it creates the potential for long-term sustainability. Private money alone is often unstable. Public recognition and institutional structure make it easier to build systems that last.
He also emphasized something bigger: recognition should not only be about competition. It should also be about health, development, and creating better environments for young people. If governments treat esports seriously, they can help shape it into something healthier, more sustainable, and more professionally organized. For countries across Latin America, that could become one of the biggest accelerators of ecosystem maturity.
Many countries have multiple groups claiming authority over esports, which creates confusion for sponsors, brands, publishers, and public institutions. Without a recognized structure, it becomes harder to coordinate growth. That is why Mario believes stronger national and international governance will be crucial for the next phase of esports development.
Talent development is still one of the biggest missing pieces. Toward the end of the interview, Mario raised one of the most important strategic challenges in esports today: talent identification.
As Team Manager for Colombia, he is thinking not only about current players, but about how a country builds a pipeline. He argued that esports still lacks the kind of structured grassroots talent development that traditional sports rely on. A player’s level matters, but so does rate of progression, adaptability, long-term potential, and the environment around that player. Countries need better methods to identify talent early, train it properly, and support it with coaches, analysts, psychologists, and nutrition professionals.
This becomes even more relevant as international opportunities grow. If esports is moving toward nation-based competition with meaningful prize pools and broader institutional recognition, then countries will need better systems to develop the next generation. Not just the current best players.
The biggest takeaway from this conversation is simple, esports education in Colombia needs:
A curriculum.
Physical spaces.
Parent trust.
University buy-in.
Public recognition.
Long-term talent development.
That is what makes Mario Agudelo’s work important. He is not only talking about what esports could become. He is actively building models that connect education, performance, and ecosystem development in practical ways. For anyone interested in the future of esports education in LATAM, Colombia is a market worth watching closely. The next stage of esports growth will not belong to the regions that build the strongest foundations.
What do you think universities and institutions still get wrong about esports education? And what needs to happen for LATAM to build stronger long-term esports structures?