Aspiring video game designer, Kyla Gorman, was recently awarded $10,000 in scholarship money via the 2009 Penny Arcade Scholarship, and she plans to put it to good use as she pursues a degree in video game design at the University of Southern California (where Troy Polamalu played ball – go Steelers!).

“I’ll be forever thankful for the opportunity the PA Scholarship has given me to attend USC, one of the world’s best game design curriculums,” said Gorman. “I’ve already been able work on several trial games including a board game called Spacewolves that I designed with some friends. Look out gamer community, I’m coming up!”

The Penny Arcade’s scholarship has been helping students with a passion for gaming since 2006. Each year the winner is selected based on specific criteria including service, leadership, character, financial need, and perceived potential in terms of industry impact.

Think you’ve got what it takes to make it big as a video game designer? If so, the application process for 2010 hopefuls starts up in Spring of 2010. In the meantime, check out one of Kyla’s Spacewolves project.

Tags: penny-arcade, scholarship, Spacewolves, University of Southern California, USC

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• Jonathan Zungre, Contributor (New York, NY)

2 Comments » Tiffany Martin on November 4, 2009 6:28 pm It’s great to see Penny Arcade’s continuing philanthropy! I can’t wait to see what happens with students who receive the scholarships. I love how they give back–it shows people that gamers aren’t sociopaths. Or at least THEY aren’t. Lol. Chad Lakkis on November 4, 2009 7:14 pm Agreed Tiffany. We may be looking at the future of gaming. RSS feed for comments on this post. Comment Now Note: Commenting on Ripten does not currently require registration, however to be eligible for contests on the site, you must be a registered user. Name (required) Mail (will not be published) (required) Website Commenting Rules: No hate speech allowed. If you must argue, please debate intelligently. Comments containing selected keywords or outbound links will be put into moderation to help prevent spam. Ripten reserves the right to delete comments and ban anyone who doesn't follow the rules. Thanks. Notify me of followup comments Tired of the Goomba? Upload your own custom comment avatar.