This lecture will address challenges faced by academic programs that wish to provide students with hands-on project experience as a degree requirement. Strategies for creating an academic environment that fosters collaborative group projects and methods for guiding students to successfully complete and deliver games as Master's program thesis projects will be discussed. Institutional-level topics include: intellectual property ownership and management, support for managing university/client relations, and support for managing funding and technology infrastructures.Team-level topics include: team formation and task assignment, project management and methods for dissemination of finished projects.