Can videogames overcome obstacles in education? Or have an impact on society by teaching leadership principles and other real-world skills?

That’s exactly what Dr. Constance Steinkuhler is exploring, through her work at UCI.

Constance is Co-Director of UCI’s Games+Learning+Society (GLS) Center, and Chair of the annual GLS Conference. She is also Chair of UCI’s Game Design and Interactive Media Program.

Her experience with games as a vehicle for education and better societal outcomes includes founding the nonprofit Higher Education Video Games Alliance, and publishing two books and more than a hundred articles. Not to mention serving as a Senior Policy Analyst for the Obama administration, advising on videogames and digital media.

And her research and experiences as an educator are revealing some exciting possibilities for the ways videogames might be effective in preparing students to succeed.

Constance talked about her background, shared the story of the GLS Center and offered a closer look at some of the exciting programs happening, right now, in which videogames could transform the ways we learn and relate to one another as a society.

On this edition of Over Coffee® we cover:

• Constance’s academic background at the start of her professional journey (she has THREE B.A. degrees!);

• How she first became interested in the sociological aspects of videogames and play;

• The story of the Games + Learning + Society Center;

• Some of the GLS Center’s current work;

• How one such project, NASEF, teaches life skills through e-sports;

• Ways to tamp down the toxic side of online gaming behavior, such as hate speech and harassment;

• How Constance’s research findings dispel some of the stereotypes about gaming ;

• How games could foster literacy;

• A mini-lesson on creating games that work well.