Enok Kim’s path to TC went through the roughest part of Almaty, the capital of Kazakhstan, where his Korean parents worked in missionary social service. “I grew up in the red-light district, basically,” Kim says. Fluent in Russian, he went to an international school and then on to California, where he initially enrolled at Azusa Pacific University planning to major in business. He transferred to California State-Long Beach, served as a research assistant to a professor working on iPad-based instructional design and as an instructor at a charter school and in afterschool programs, and ended up majoring in education.
Why TC
Kim came to TC partly for the chance to blend two passions: working with kids, and technology. He also came for the challenge of attending what he considers the top school in the field, and to live outside his comfort zone in New York City. “I wanted to test myself,” he says. “It worked out pretty well.”
TC Takeaway
Last summer, Kim and a few friends were mulling over their learnings from “Video Games and Education,” a course taught by Research Assistant Professor Joey Lee. “Kids spend five to seven hours a week consuming media, and we were fascinated by how we can use that tool for education,” Kim says. And thus a start-up, LearnPlay Games, was born. The company has already designed games for major clients and is currently “play-testing” its own math game. Kim says that finding colleagues who shared his passions and spent long hours with him in TC’s games lab (“It’s in the basement; not a lot of people know about it”) will be a precious memory of his time at the College.
What’s Next
First comes a month off in Guatemala, enjoying nature. Then Kim, who plans to stay in New York City, will charge full steam ahead with LearnPlay Games. “I’ve been traveling for the past 20 years,” he says. The team is speaking to big companies, schools and purveyors of MOOCs about partnerships to design new game-based education tools. “We have this motto that you learn by playing and you play by learning,” he says. “It’s something that we really believe in.”