Grand View University in Des Moines will be launching a new academic discipline unique to Iowa. Beginning this fall, students at the school will be able to major in game design. Grand View administrators say students who pursue a bachelor’s degree in Game Design will be trained in such things as animation, video production and 3-D illustration. English professor Joshua Call, who describes himself as a “lifetime gamer,” says he finds the intersection of storytelling with decision-making in gaming an important academic pursuit.

“Games are, if you break them down, a way of rendering complicated information, decision making, and ideas through a graphic and interactive format,” Call says. The introduction of the major in gaming design comes as Grand View is set to join around 50 colleges nationwide in making E-Sports a varsity level activity. The vice president of student affairs at Grand View, Jay Prescott, says top players are already being recruited and offered scholarships.

“Just like other sports, there are positions on the team within the game of League of Legends, so we will actually recruit positions just like you would in basketball or football,” Prescott says. The E-Sports team will go up against other squads, via online video, in the five-player game called League of Legends. Prescott says interest in E-Sports is rapidly growing. He expects the number of schools participating in the video game competition will double within the next year.

(Radio Iowa/Reporting by Iowa Public Radio’s Rob Dillard)

Here is the latest Iowa news from The Associated Press at 4:50 a.m. CST

GRAETTINGER, Iowa (AP) — A fiery train derailment in Iowa has at one group suggesting that the industry should move faster to upgrade aging rail tankers. A Union Pacific train hauling 100 tankers full of ethanol derailed early Friday over a creek near Graettinger, about 160 miles northwest of Des Moines. It sent 27 tanker cars off the tracks. Federal rules enacted in 2015 call for replacing or retrofitting the tankers by 2029.

DENMARK, Iowa (AP) — The Lee County Sheriff’s Office says a southeastern Denmark man has been shot, and his son is believed to be the shooter. Sheriff Stacy Weber says in a news release that deputies and medics found a man suffering from two gunshot wounds in a house Saturday morning. Authorities arrested the son in Fort Madison, and he was taken to juvenile detention center in Montrose. He has been charged with willful injury.

WEBSTER CITY, Iowa (AP) — Investigators have not yet been able to determine what caused a central Iowa house fire this week that killed one man and injured a woman. Webster City Fire Chief Charles Stansfield tells the Fort Dodge Messenger that investigators are still working. Firefighters who arrived at the burning house Wednesday night found the couple inside. Both were taken to a hospital, where the man died. The woman remains in critical condition. Their names have not yet been released.

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The Iowa Democratic Party has announced that Kevin Geiken is the state party’s new director, replacing outgoing executive director Ben Foecke. A party news release says Geiken worked on former President Barack Obama’s 2008 and 2012 campaigns. He also served as deputy executive director for the Iowa Democratic Party during the 2014 cycle.

GRAETTINGER, Iowa (AP) — A fiery train derailment in rural Iowa has at least one group suggesting that the industry should move faster to upgrade aging rail tankers. A Union Pacific train hauling 100 tankers full of ethanol derailed early Friday over a creek near Graettinger, about 160 miles northwest of Des Moines. It sent 27 tanker cars off the tracks.

Federal rules enacted in 2015 call for replacing or retrofitting the tankers in question by 2029, although most would have to come off the tracks sooner. Karen Darch, co-chair of an Illinois-based coalition that has pushed for rail safety enhancements, says she would like “to see the industry stepping up and beating the deadline.”

GRAETTINGER, Iowa (AP) — An investigator with the National Transportation Safety Board says an ethanol-fueled fire in northwestern Iowa at the site of rural train derailment is still burning nearly 36 hours after it erupted.

Peter Knudson with the NTSB says that two tankers carrying ethanol were still burning midmorning Saturday, keeping investigators away from the site. Knudson said investigators still planned to interview train crew members Saturday and perform other limited investigation until they can take a look at the site.

The derailment occurred around 1 a.m. Friday near Graettinger, about 160 miles northwest of Des Moines. It sent 27 tanker cars, each carrying 25,000 gallons of ethanol, off the tracks. Two crew members escaped unharmed, and no other injuries had been reported.

The train was operated by Omaha-based Union Pacific Railroad.

w/ Chris Parks

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The Palo Alto County Sheriff’s Office said late Friday afternoon, residents of three households that were evacuated near the site of a train derailment and fire in the northwest Iowa county have been allowed to return home. The department says the three homes were each at least a half-mile from the site, where the ethanol-fueled fire was still burning late Friday afternoon.

The derailment occurred around 1 a.m. Friday near Graettinger. It sent 27 tanker cars, each carrying 25,000 gallons of ethanol, off the tracks. The sheriff’s office says two crew members escaped unharmed. No injuries have been reported.

Iowa DNR Field office supervisor Ken Hessenius said Friday afternoon that “there was a pretty big explosion” around 2:30 p.m. at the site, but that officials expect the fire to have burned out by Saturday, allowing investigators and railroad crews to better assess the damage then.  He says it did not appear any significant amounts of ethanol had spilled into a creek at the derailment site after staff from his agency checked downstream. Hessenius says a water sample from the creek hadn’t yet been lab tested, but said the water appeared uncontaminated after “a smell test.”

Earlier in the day, Friday, the National Transportation Safety Board said it was sending some of a 15-member investigative team from the site of a fatal train collision on the Mississippi coast to rural northwest Iowa, to look into a derailment that caused the ethanol-fueled fire. Some members of the team will be coming from Biloxi, Mississippi, where the agency is investigating a Tuesday crash in which a Texas tour bus was hit by a freight train at a crossing, killing four. Other members of the investigative team heading to Iowa  come from NTSB headquarters in Washington.

Red Oak Police report the arrest Friday afternoon of an Elliott man on an active Montgomery County warrant. 21-year old Devin Michael Thompson was taken into custody at around 3-p.m. on the warrant for a Controlled Substance Violation. Thompson was being held in the Montgomery County Jail on a $2,000 bond.

A traffic stop in Adams County Friday late morning resulted in the arrest on a drug charge, of a woman from Nebraska. The Adams County Sheriff’s Office says 19-year old Yaasmyn Spivey, of Omaha, was arrested for Possession of Drug Paraphernalia, after her vehicle was pulled over at around 10:37-a.m. and a consent search resulted in the recovery of a marijuana pipe. Spivey was booked into the Adams County Jail, where her bond was set at $300.

SIOUX CITY, Iowa (AP) — A woman has pleaded not guilty to a charge related to a chase and a Sioux City man’s gunfight with a sheriff’s deputy. The Sioux City Journal reports that 27-year-old Brittney Hood, of Sioux City, entered the plea Thursday to a charge of eluding.

Authorities say she was driving a vehicle carrying 24-year-old Melvin Spencer and another man on Feb. 26 when a deputy tried to pull her over. Prosecutors say she sped away but finally stopped and fled on foot into a field, where the deputy caught her.

Authorities say Spencer then drove away in the vehicle and later exchanged shots with another deputy. The other man in the vehicle was wounded. Spencer’s been charged with attempted murder.