Pub­lic edu­ca­tion is the only solu­tion for pre­serv­ing a con­sti­tu­tional democ­racy
Have to start with our young peo­ple; knowl­edge is not handed down through the gene pool
We have some work to do to get them edu­cated
Only a lit­tle more than 1/3 can even name the three branches of gov­ern­ment, let alone tell us what they do

It’s not only through ral­lies or marches
Young peo­ple are begin­ning to get engaged in pub­lic life through the inter­net – email, blog­ging, face­book
Young peo­ple can take lead­er­ship roles in these spaces
This is a start in the polit­i­cal cam­paign world, but much more can be done

Have to get them engaged first and show them that gov­ern­ment does have an impact on their lives and vice versa
We need to use the medium they’re com­fort­able with – a com­puter screen
Give them own­er­ship and tools to use

Part­ner­ing with ari­zona state and George­town law school – “our courts” web­site is free to all users
will allow stu­dents to engage in real issues and prob­lems and enable them to find solu­tions to real prob­lems
lets them step into the shoes of a judge, etc.
encour­ages young peo­ple to make their voices heard in their communities

Two inten­tions for this project

1. Cur­ricu­lum to be used in class­rooms around the nation
   one con­se­quence of No Child Left Behind is that civics edu­ca­tion has been squeezed out because there’s not test­ing or fund­ing for it
   leaves a huge gap
   can’t for­get that the pri­mary pur­pose of pub­lic schools in Amer­ica is to pro­duce knowl­edge­able cit­i­zens who have the skills and knowl­edge to sus­tain our nation and form of gov­ern­ment
   must also stim­u­late real think­ing and debate, as well as a com­mit­ment to civic engage­ment
   will exceed state standards
2. Pri­mar­ily for young peo­ple to use on their own time
   kids spend more time with media than at school or with par­ents
   can we get them to spend just a lit­tle of that time on civic engage­ment
   young peo­ple are inter­ested in fair­ness and jus­tice
   Jim Gee is help­ing to cre­ate a truly immer­sive learn­ing expe­ri­ence
   will have them argu­ing real legal issues against the com­puter and against each other
   we must ensure that tomorrow’s lead­ers are informed and engaged in rich debate that leads to wise decision-making

The more we can pop­u­late the medium avail­able to young peo­ple with these social jus­tice pieces, the more informed they’ll be

Q&A

Reuters: what videogames have you played before?
SDoC: I don’t play videogames – sorry

Reuters: some say games pro­mote vio­lence and are dan­ger­ously addic­tive for kids – does that worry you?
SDoC: cer­tainly, but that’s not the kind of game we’re going to produce

NY Times: can you give exam­ples of issues in the game and when will it be avail­able?
SDoC: we hope by next fall to have the fun­da­men­tals on the web­site; resources for teach­ers will be up in Sep­tem­ber; Jim Gee’s work will be avail­able by the end of Sep­tem­ber; first inter­ac­tive part will be a t-shirt with a logo on it for high school stu­dents to wear – some­thing that would raise a first amend­ment issue; she would love to put up some­thing for stu­dents about the 2nd amend­ment (what does it mean – is it a per­sonal right or not?); these are things stu­dents can learn to be engaged in; can pro­vide them with prece­dents, the Con­sti­tu­tion – let them make argu­ments for both sides

Q: Why do games & inter­ac­tive tech­nol­ogy bet­ter serve your mis­sion?
SDoC: I’ve observed my own chil­dren and grand­chil­dren; she’s illit­er­ate as a com­puter user, but her grand­chil­dren can do any­thing on there in min­utes; they’ll sit in front of the screen for a long time and remain engaged; tells her that this is a good tool for this pur­pose; she believes that when we learn some­thing by doing it (by hav­ing it hap­pen to us), when you make an argu­ment, etc. – you remem­ber and under­stand it bet­ter, moreso than read­ing a text­book or lis­ten­ing to a lec­ture; her sense is that when we read some­thing and learn it, there is a part of the brain that will receive it; but if we learn it by doing it, a dif­fer­ent part of the brain will also light up (the emo­tional part – the “a-ha” moment); will ignite a dif­fer­ent part of the brain; so things learned in this fash­ion stick with us longer; that’s what she thinks will be proven in the future

Q: what long-term out­comes do you hope to achieve with this project? Ideal place in 5 years?
SDoC: to know that class­rooms all across the coun­try are using this pro­gram and expos­ing chil­dren to civics edu­ca­tion; will be eas­ier for teach­ers to plug stu­dents into this cur­ricu­lum – they don’t have to learn it them­selves :-p

Q: what advice would you give to those who are try­ing this for the first time?
SDoC: there are so many sub­jects that peo­ple in this room are work­ing on – all kinds of great pro­grams; there will be as many pro­grams as there are fer­tile imag­i­na­tions, and we have a lot of those