First in the World Grant

Improving Access to College through Games, Technology and Social Media

 

A First in the World Grant

What We Are Trying to Accomplish/Model

William G. Tierney + Zoe B. Corwin

 

The Pullias Center for Higher Education at the University of Southern California’s Rossier School of Education recently received a $3.2 million grant from the United States Department of Education’s Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education through their First in the World (FITW) Program. The new investment will enable the Pullias Center to drastically expand the reach of its online college access game, Mission: Admission, created in collaboration with USC’s Game Innovation Lab directed by Tracy Fullerton.

 

The purpose of the project is to implement and evaluate an innovative game-based intervention designed to boost college-going outcomes in high schools throughout California. The key project innovation is in meeting students where they spend time—in online and game spaces—by using games, technology, and social media tools to motivate, educate, and support students in applying to college and for financial aid. Through a random-control trial and case studies from selected sites, researchers will explore the effects of game-based learning on students’ college-going efficacy, college knowledge, FAFSA completion, and college enrollment.

 

 

 

 

The goal of FITW grants, totaling $75 million, is to enable the United States to assume primacy once again in college-going and postsecondary graduation. A core belief in the United States throughout the country’s history has been that education plays a major role in enabling people to move out of poverty. These grants are a continuation of that idea. 

 

The Pullias Center has worked at improving college access on several fronts through our mentoring and writing programs, research on community colleges, analyses of postsecondary performance and productivity, investigations of the for-profit sector, and most recently, how technology, games, and social media might enable more individuals to gain access to higher education. The need for purposeful change in the secondary and postsecondary sectors, and a dedication to innovation and creativity are core assumptions that drive the Pullias Center’s work. We are gratified that this FITW grant will enable us to test some of our key hypotheses surrounding the use of games in increasing access to higher education.

 

The project will enable the Pullias Center to convene a stellar group of researchers, practitioners, and game designers across disciplines and institutions to tackle a persistent problem in a new way. Over the course of four years, the project team will implement the college application game Mission: Admission in 50 schools across the state of California through a web-based platform that thousands of students will be able to access on their mobile devices. Teachers will receive training and support for how to use the game-based tools. The grant includes rigorous evaluation of the effects of game play on students’ college trajectories.

 

Our collaborative research team includes Gale Sinatra from USC’s Rossier School of Education, Dennis Wixon from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, and an independent evaluation team led by Robert Reichardt from Augenblick, Palaich, and Associates. Key development partners include game designers from FutureBound, a company that grew out of a collaboration between the USC Pullias Center and Game Innovation Lab, and social media experts from MTV’s Get Schooled Foundation. Dissemination and implementation will be facilitated through a partnership with the California Student Aid Commission and their Cal-SOAP affiliates.

 

The new grant builds upon development, research, and evaluation activities funded by the Institute of Education Sciences in the U.S. Department of Education, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, The Rosalinde and Arthur Gilbert Foundation, and the TG Public Benefits Program. The project began with internal support from USC’s Office of the Provost.

 

For more information and updates on the project, please contact Zoë Corwin at zcorwin@usc.edu or visit Pullias Center Games Project.