If you're looking for innovative ways to connect with your community using local history materials and digital collections, consider applying to participate in this IMLS grant-funded program. See call for public library participation below:

National Call for Libraries – Summer 2022

We are recruiting 25+ libraries to become hubs for making outdoor games and interactive stories — using your local history, community voices, and neighborhood landmarks. This is a 2022-23 initiative, thanks to an IMLS grant.

Why apply today? There is a growing need to engage beyond library walls, including with digital media — as revealed by the COVID pandemic. By joining this program, your library will become a hub for making our own stories and outdoor games. We provide live training and pay for materials, and even run workshops in game design for your patrons over Zoom.

Our remarkable approach to “low tech” keeps the focus on telling community stories, from escape rooms with local history and public art, to audio tours that feature resident voices and send archival photos by text message. The tool we will teach you is called Hive Mechanic, and it does not require any programming experience to use; it was made by the Game Center at American University. Learn more at one of our info sessions below.

Read more about our project overview, or see a list of successful games/stories.

Apply here (or sign up to hear more)

1. Apply to participate by August 15, 2022, with our online form.
2. …and/or sign up to hear more and stay in touch by email (optional)

Info sessions, more information and contact details

(a) Attend an information session by Zoom. Answers to common questions will be posted to our page for Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) for libraries.

• Session 1: Wednesday, July 20 at 1pm EST, 2022. Register here for Zoom link (up until the event ends). Check back here for notes afterward.
• Session 2: Thursday, July 28 at 2pm EST, 2022. Register here for Zoom link (up until the event ends). Check back here for notes afterward.
• Session 3: Wednesday, August 10 at 3pm EST, 2022. Register here for Zoom link (up until the event ends). Check back here for notes afterward.
• (A second round of applications will open in the winter with info sessions in December of 2022.)

(b) Meet us at a conference. We’ll be at several in 2022, including ALA, Games for Change, JCLC, and ARSL. Learn about successful projects and see the tools in action.

(c) Contact us by email. Write to Benjamin Stokes, director of the Playful City Lab at American University, at PlayfulCityLab@gmail.com