Author: by Beth A.

Tom Frisina, Talent Development Executive at Electronic Arts (EA), will join the team at the Masters of Digital Media (MDM) Program as a part-time faculty member, Dr. Gerri Sinclair, Executive Director of the MDM Program announced recently. Frisina will work with the graduate program’s students to teach them the Business of Digital Media at the Great Northern Way Campus (GNWC) Digital Media Centre. As a part-time faculty member, Frisina will provide students with a comprehensive view of what it is like to work in the games business. Frisina will focus on Cinematic Arts Producer and Designer job descriptions, but all elements of game content and their resident product marketing approaches will be covered. When completed, students will have a clear understanding of the industry and what role they are best suited to play in this growing arena. Frisina will also use his broad industry connections to bring in guest lecturers from around the globe including producers, project managers, technical directors, and creative directors, among others. Tom Frisina joined EA in 1997 as Vice-President of EA’s affiliated label business, then called EA Distribution (EAD). He was chartered with taking EAD from a distribution business into a world-class third party interactive publisher. Between 1997 and August 2003 Frisina managed the tremendous growth of this business unit. Frisina is responsible for bringing the Bond, Medal of Honor, Battlefield, Valve Half-Life Distribution, Lord of the Rings and Crysis franchises to EA. In November 2006 he stepped down from his role as General Manager into a newly created position of Talent Development Executive. Along with his EA experience, Frisina also has extensive experience as an entrepreneur and has founded several innovative companies in the gaming and digital media areas. An interesting character, Frisina is trained as a symphony conductor and spent three years in Naval Intelligence with a Top Secret Clearance in the late ‘60s. The Masters of Digital Media Program is a full-time professional graduate degree program that provides students with team-based experiences focused on project learning in close collaboration with B.C.'s games and digital media industry. The MDM Program is 20-months in length and includes a paid internship. Graduates will have the professional skills required to be effective creators, practitioners, and senior managers in this rapidly growing industry. The degree will be jointly awarded by Vancouver's four major post secondary institutions: the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design, and the British Columbia Institute of Technology.