Promoting game accessibility: Experiencing an induction on inclusive design practice at the global games jam

Copyright @ 2013 The AuthorsThe Global Games Jam (GGJ) attracts many people who are passionate about games development, coming from a range of educational backgrounds. Therefore, the event can be experienced by novices and student developers as an opportunity for learning. This provides an opening to promote themes and ideas that could help form future thinking about games design, emerging as a form of induction on key design issues for new practitioners. Such an approach aims to raise awareness about issues which learners could help develop and take with them into industry. However, the experience itself affords a deep experiential rhetoric and dialogue with experts that could be an effective pedagogical tool for issues seldom addressed deeply in formal educational settings. This paper describes an account by one such individual, being introduced to game accessibility through participation in the GGJ. As such, it is not intended as a rigorous empirical analysis, but rather a perspective on one way a game jam can be experienced, inviting further research on the topic

Informing Students about Their College Options: A Proposal for Broadening the Expanding College Opportunities Project

Most high-achieving, low-income students do not even apply to selective colleges despite being highly qualified for admission and success at these institutions. Because they do not apply, these students forgo the generous academic resources, increased financial aid, and better collegiate and career opportunities that selective schools offer. To increase opportunities and improve outcomes for these students, we propose building on the success of an innovative intervention, the Expanding College Opportunities (ECO) Project. At a relatively low cost of about $6 per student contacted, ECO sent the following to high-achieving, low-income students: targeted and personalized information on their college options, information on the process for applying, and details of the financial information relevant to their situations. The intervention had a profound effect on their college application behavior, leading to a substantial increase in their propensity to apply to more-selective colleges commensurate with their academic achievements. Not only did students apply to more-selective schools, but they were accepted and matriculated at such schools in greater numbers, and early evidence points to their academic success in these programs. The promising results of this low-cost program suggest that ECO should be expanded. This paper proposes steps to expand and improve ECO to reach more low-income, high-achieving students across the country by partnering with respected third-party organizations such as the College Board and ACT. ECO can also serve as a model for designing and applying this type of intervention to other populations of students. The success of the ECO Project highlights the importance of researchers being able to access relevant government data to design targeted and effective programs and polici

Mandate-driven networking eco-system : a paradigm shift in end-to-end communications

The wireless industry is driven by key stakeholders that follow a holistic approach of "one-system-fits-all" that leads to moving network functionality of meeting stringent End-to-End (E2E) communication requirements towards the core and cloud infrastructures. This trend is limiting smaller and new players for bringing in new and novel solutions. For meeting these E2E requirements, tenants and end-users need to be active players for bringing their needs and innovations. Driving E2E communication not only in terms of quality of service (QoS) but also overall carbon footprint and spectrum efficiency from one specific community may lead to undesirable simplifications and a higher level of abstraction of other network segments may lead to sub-optimal operations. Based on this, the paper presents a paradigm shift that will enlarge the role of wireless innovation at academia, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SME)'s, industries and start-ups while taking into account decentralized mandate-driven intelligence in E2E communications

From Consumers to Producers: African American Middle School Students as Game Designers

Given the low number of African Americans in Computer Science, we recognize the need to take effective measures to build and sustain a pipeline between K-12 education and institutions of higher learning with the hope that more African American students will pursue careers in computing related fields such as gaming. To support this effort, we engage African American middle school students in a 4-day game design workshop with the intent of transitioning these students from being consumers to being producers of technology. We create and evaluate scaffolds to assist middle school students with designing their first video games using Scratch. Preliminary findings suggest that most of the students are able to define the formal elements of their games, including number players, game objectives, and rules, but struggle with the concepts of procedures and boundaries of the game. These same students also demonstrate a basic understanding of dramatic elements (e.g. challenge, play, and character), but struggle with the concept of storyline. Finally, African American students have very explicit ideas about the kinds of games they want to create, choosing to create games that promote a more inclusive gameplay experience. KEYWORDS: African American middle school students, game desig

Climate Change Games as Boundary Objects: Fostering Dialogic Communication within Stakeholder Engagement

Rising waters and the increasing devastation of flood events make coastal resilience a significant issue in the Hampton Roads region of Virginia, particularly in the city of Norfolk. Enhancing resilience requires ongoing stakeholder engagement designed to invite dialogue while encouraging cross-jurisdictional collaboration and comprehensive problem-solving. Climate change games have been employed to support these endeavors. This dissertation provides a response to the following research questions: 1) What is the origin of the climate change game genre? 2) Why are key stakeholders in coastal resilience using climate change games? And 3) how do these games operate for these key stakeholders? To answer these questions, I focused on two games used in resilience-related stakeholder engagement workshops in 2018 in Coastal Virginia: the Multi-hazard Tournament (MHT) and the Game of Floods. I conducted semistructured observational field notes and survey research, including interview and questionnaires, followed by thematic analysis according to notions of Susan Leigh Star and James Griesemer’s (1989) boundary objects. Designed for a wide range of contexts, including public outreach, education, training, and stakeholder engagement, I found that the CC game genre emerges from (and is a manifestation of) a number of related traditions: technical communication, urban planning, modeling and simulation, and game studies—fields that are, themselves, intertwined with a broad array of disciplines. These games are complex and idiosyncratic; while no one disciplinary tradition can adequately explain their work, the notion of boundary objects can. These games are boundary objects (a manifestation of a range of disciplinary traditions), and they operate as boundary objects for these key stakeholders (encouraging dialogic communication among diverse audiences). I merge multidisciplinary scholarship with data from survey research to generate a rhetorical boundary work heuristic that articulates the goals of these games: foster boundary work for varied audiences within intense design periods using charrette and game design strategies. I analyze the MHT and the Game of Floods according to this heuristic, demonstrating that, while both games work toward these goals, more could be done to enhance their boundary work, and I close with key takeaways for practitioners to use as they continue developing and employing CC games

Scalable Game Design Switzerland

Das Modul «Medien und Informatik» des Lehrplans 21 verlangt von Primarlehrpersonen, dass sie mit ihren Schülerinnen und Schülern verschiedene Kompetenzen und Inhalte im Bereich der Informatik erarbeiten. Für die Erfüllung dieses Auftrags benötigen die angehenden Lehrpersonen eine entsprechende Ausbildung, die sie mit dem relevanten Fachwissen und den erforderlichen Kompetenzen in der Informatik ausstattet. Um dies zu gewährleisten, hat die Professur für Informatische Bildung (IB) der PH FHNW im Herbst 2017 mit dem zweisemestrigen Modul «Informatische Bildung» eines der schweizweit ersten obligatorischen Veranstaltungen für alle Bachelorstudierenden des Instituts Primarstufe eingeführt. Das Modul ist die praktische Umsetzung der theoretischen Konzepte und fachdidaktischen Ansätze von Scalable Game Design Switzerland (SGD Switzerland). Bei SGD Switzerland handelt es sich um die auf Schweizer Erfordernisse angepasste Weiterentwicklung von SGD USA – ein jahrzehntelang erprobtes umfassendes Curriculum für die Vermittlung von informatischer Bildung. Grundlage und Essenz von SGD Switzerland und somit auch von dem Konzept des neuen Moduls ist das Verständnis von Denken mit dem Computer – das sogenannte Computational Thinking. Das Konzept des Moduls «Informatischen Bildung», bei welchem die Schulung des analytischen, lösungsorientierten Denkens mit dem Computer im Fokus steht, ist ein Novum schweizweit. Dieser Beitrag erläutert das Konzept des Moduls IB und präsentiert einen ersten Einblick in die Eindrücke der Studenten, die den Kurs besucht haben

Paths Forward for the Global Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) Sector

The report summarizes key challenges and recommendations discussed at an event entitled "Paths Forward for the Global Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) Sector" hosted by the Global Water Futures Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS). The series of discussions focused on ways to catalyze and strengthen efforts to address international WASH problems. The sessions aimed to develop a set of actionable recommendations to improve the outcomes of global WASH programs and to increase the capacity of the U.S.-based public and private sectors to engage in program activities related to global WASH challenges. Each session examined a key challenge facing the water, sanitation, and hygiene sector. Roundtables focused on the following themes: "Building the Momentum for WASH Awareness," "Growing the Resource Base for WASH Efforts," "Making Our WASH Investments Count," and "Breaking the WASH Silo.

Applying design science research methodology in the development of virtual reality forest management services

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