Susie Quinn and Shelby Wartick, Dubuque Esports League founders, met through Young Professionals of Dubuque around 2007. They both served on the executive committee, and their committee remained close over the years, meeting regularly to socialize and catch up. As their careers have grown, so did our families.

Fast forward to August 2022, and they both have teenage sons. The two met regularly to discuss how their sons struggled to find their way within the school system and were reluctant to return to traditional sports and/or music programs after Covid-19. As mothers, they wanted to help their sons get involved and guide them to discover a community of peers where they felt they belonged. Both their boys loved to game. However, as moms and their limited view of gaming, they believed playing video games was getting in the way of them doing things other teenagers were doing to grow their social-emotional skills.

Soon they started to recognize that their sons were learning leadership, technical, and social skills through gaming. Susie and Shelby discovered that both of their sons already had a circle of friends that made them feel like they belonged; they were online instead of in the traditional sense. The moms took notice of how their sons would come alive while playing these games and were impressed.

One lunch, Susie brought up esports to Shelby and shared she had looked into it and thought it would be perfect for our sons but couldn’t find any programs around us. She shared that it would provide an in-person community for them to play video games. The two decided to investigate the world of scholastic esports, and before you knew it, they decided to make it their mission to bring a structured, scholastic esports program to their community for their sons and others like them.