DeKALB — A new video game design club was approved in a 24-0 vote at a Jan. 29 Student Association meeting and will give students an opportunity to become involved in a field that is growing on campus.

Robert Kondratowicz, Video Game Design Club president spoke on behalf of the organization at the meeting in the Holmes Student Center, Sky Room.

“Video game development is a rapidly growing field that NIU seems to be behind on,” Kondratowicz said during his speech. “There is an interest here at NIU, but those who are interested don’t know where to start or are ineligible for the few related classes that NIU has to offer. That is where the Video Game Design Club comes into play.”

The organization promotes the art and skill of designing video games and will teach basic skills during their meetings. Members share and discuss topics as well as showcase their work.

Club members will also partake in video game design competitions. In international competitions, individuals compete to see who can create a more entertaining, well-designed video game. On NIU’s campus, the club plans to dedicate 48 hours of time to work together as a team to create an interesting game.

Dates for club meetings are tentative and will take place at 6 p.m. Mondays in the Digital Convergence Lab on the third floor of the Founder’s Memorial Library.

SA Appoints new Supreme Court justices

Stephen Samuels, senior political science major, and graduate law student Keith Stiggers were appointed as SA Supreme Court justices during the meeting.

“I want to be a physical representation of the branch,” Samuels said. “I also want to make sure that fairness and objectivity are applied.”

The SA entrusts authority in five justices. Some of their duties include ruling on the constitutionality of actions taken by the SA legislative branch, the SA executive branch and any SA-recognized student organization, interpreting the constitution and bylaws of SA-recognized organizations, ruling on appeals relating to the proper conduct of elections and deciding the wording of referenda.

Both appointees gained their positions by unanimous vote from the Senate.

“We look forward to seeing both justices in student court,” SA Senate Speaker Christine Wang said.

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Morgan Fink is a staff writer. She can be reached at [email protected].