Since 1997, the Fort Smith office of the Aurora Research Institute has provided technology-based training to youth in the community. This training primarily consisted of web site design (HTML and graphic design) as well as introducing youth to technology skills, life-enhancement skills, entrepreneurial training, etc.

In 1999, it was decided that we would focus on games creation with content that was unique to the Northwest Territories and this was called Project: CIGEMON (Culturally Interactive Games). Five Flash-based games were created: hunting, dog-sledding, fire-fighting, Dene handgames and a sliding tile games were created and refined over the subsequent two summers.

While it has been a challenge to secure yearly funding to continue the training it has never been a problem to fill our seats with interested youth. Our most recent efforts are to develop formalized curriculum as a one year introduction to computer gaming as a career choice. To facilitate this we are currently running an ongoing survey to accumulate data that we can incorporate into our proposal efforts.

We welcome any and all participation in the survey (called Evolve) which can be accessed at http://surveys.nwtresearch.com/evolve.aspx.