2010 HASTAC/MacArthur Foundation International Digital Media and Learning Competition
HASTAC
$2 MILLION COMPETITION OPENS FOR IDEAS TO TRANSFORM LEARNING
Durham, NC and Irvine, CA – December 16, 2009. The John D. and
Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, in collaboration with the
University of California, Irvine, Duke University and the virtual
network HASTAC, today
launched the third annual open-call competition that will provide $2
million in awards to innovators shaping the field of digital media and
learning. President Obama named the Digital Media and Learning
Competition as part of
his initiative to improve education in math and science in a speech on
November 23rd. The competition is supported through a grant to the
University of California, Irvine and administered by HASTAC.
The competition seeks designers, inventors, entrepreneurs,
researchers, and others to build digital experiences—the learning labs
of the 21st century—that help young people interact, share, build,
tinker, and explore in new and
innovative ways. In a new component for 2010, Sony Computer
Entertainment America (SCEA) and Electronic Arts (EA), in cooperation
with Entertainment Software Association and Information Technology
Industry Council, will
team with the competition to support the development of new science
and math-related levels or adventures in popular existing games.
There are two types of awards. Detailed information about these awards
can be found online at www.dmlcompetition.net:
• Learning Lab Designer awards, which will range from $30,000-
$200,000, are for learning environments and digital media-based
experiences that allow young people to grapple with social
challenges through activities based on the social nature, contexts,
and ideas of science, technology, engineering
• Game Changers awards, which range from $5,000-$50,000, are for
creative levels designed with either LittleBigPlanet™ or Spore™
Galactic Adventures that offer young people engaging game play
experiences and that
incorporate and leverage principles of science, technology,
engineering and math for learning. Each category will include several
Best in Class awards selected by expert judges, as well as a People’s
Choice
Award selected by the general public. The online application system
will open on January 7 and will include three rounds of submissions,
with public comment at each stage. In February 2010, a special
competition will be opened
up to youth from ages 12-17.
"Digital media provides an important opportunity to re-imagine
learning in the 21st century," said Connie Yowell, Director of
MacArthur's education grantmaking. "Through the competition, we may
find that games
such as LittleBigPlanet™ and Spore™, which offer opportunities for
collaborative and complex problem solving, can be powerful tools to
engage the next generation in science, technology, engineering and
math - in and out of the
classroom. By working with Sony Computer Entertainment America and
Electronic Arts, the Digital Media and Learning Competition will be
able to tap into the innovation and scale of private industry to
advance teaching and
learning."
Information about applying for the competition can be found online at
www.dmlcompetition.net. The website includes details about timeline,
application requirements, project descriptions from the first two
Digital Media and
Learning Competitions, and opportunities for asking questions,
following blogs and news feeds, and learning more about the
competition.
“Learning labs promote learning together with others, by interactively
doing, trying, sometimes failing. They help us to reimagine and expand
our understanding of learning across all domains of knowledge,” said
Cathy N.
Davidson, Duke University Professor Davidson, along with David Theo
Goldberg, Director of the University of California Humanities Research
Institute, are co-founders of HASTAC and manage the competition as a
team.
"We're thrilled by the opportunity to participate and support the Game
Changers competition. If you provide creative people with the right
tools, great technology, and a collaborative environment, amazing
things can happen,”
said Jack Tretton, president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment
America. “We’re extremely excited to have LittleBigPlanet™ and PS3
serve as the vehicle for this national challenge and we greatly look
forward to all the new
innovations that will come out of this as a result."
"Video games from the Spore™ franchise innately embody the themes of
learning, exploration and creation of scientific and educational
curriculum," said Lucy Bradshaw, Vice President and General Manager of
Maxis.
"Thousands of Spore players have already re-created stunning gameplay
around real science such as protein synthesis and dinosaurs using the
Adventure Creator Tool within Spore™ Galactic Adventures. We look
forward to
offering this Adventure Tool in the Game Changer competition to
provide an entirely new group of young minds with a new way to embrace
science and education, but through a familiar avenue like video
games."
The 2010 Competition winners will join an existing community of 36
awardees from 2007 and 2008, including a video blogging project for
young women in Mumbai, India; a cutting-edge mobile phone application
that lets
children conduct digital wildlife spotting and share that information
with friends; a project that leverages low-cost laptops to help
indigenous children in Chiapas, Mexico learn by producing and sharing
their own media creations;
and an online platform for 200 classrooms around the world that allows
young people to monitor, analyze, and share information about the
declining global fish population.
The Digital Media and Learning Competition is funded by a grant from
the MacArthur Foundation to the University of California Humanities
Research Institute and Duke University and is administered by the
Humanities, Arts,
Science and Technology Advanced Collaboratory (HASTAC), a virtual
network of learning institutions. The competition is part of
MacArthur’s digital media and learning initiative, which is designed
to help determine how
digital technologies are changing the way young people learn, play,
socialize, and participate in civic life. Answers are critical to
education and other social institutions that must meet the needs of
this and future generations.
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Media contacts:
Mandy Dailey, HASTAC, mandy....@duke.edu, tel. (919) 681-8897.
Jen Humke, MacArthur Foundation, jhu...@macfound.org, tel. (312)
726-8000.
HASTAC
Duke University • 15 Franklin Center, Box 90403 • Durham, NC
27708-0403 • USA
Phone (919) 681-8897 • Fax (919) 684-8749
has...@duke.edu • www.hastac.org • www.twitter.com/hastac