Jon Dunning
Staff Writer
Graduating Murray State students may not be able to attend a graduation ceremony this semester at the real CFSB Center because of the coronavirus pandemic, but they can attend a virtual graduation ceremony hosted at the CFSB Center in Minecraft on May 9 at 1 p.m.
Murray State alumna Rachel Stewart and Systems Administrator and Esports Club Adviser Sean Mitchuson recreated the CFSB Center block-for-block in Minecraft. The pixelated version of the Racers’ sports arena can be viewed in a video on the RacerEsports Youtube channel. The video shows the CFSB Center decorated for the Spring 2020 graduation ceremony and features “Murray State Fight Song” and “Murray State Anthem” in the background.
Mitchuson said building the CFSB Center in Minecraft is a way to honor seniors who will not get a chance to walk across the stage and receive their diploma.
“I know a lot of students actually like walking at graduation,” Mitchuson said. “So I was like, ‘we should just build the CFSB Center in Minecraft and have an online commencement for them.’ We’re going to broadcast it on Twitch…kind of give them props so they can kind of feel that commencement vibe in case there’s not a good alternative.”
When Mitchuson thought to build the CFSB Center in Minecraft, he brought the idea to Stewart because he knew she was a genius at creating things in the game.
They started construction on March 24. Stewart estimated that it took the duo 50 to 60 hours to complete the project, and said this build was her biggest yet. The Murray State alumna used Google Maps and images of the CFSB Center to build the project to scale.
“I started with the basketball court and just kind of built outward from there,” Stewart said. “It was just a really fun project.”
Mitchuson said students can either attend the graduation ceremony through Minecraft by connecting to raceresports.shockbyte.games:25621 in the Java version of the game or they can watch the ceremony live on the RacerEsports Twitch channel.
