Former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor Designing Video Games?
The New York Times reports that O’Connor is working with a team to create a Web-based video game to promote civics education:
Speaking Wednesday afternoon at the annual Games for Change conference held at the New School in New York, Justice O’Connor described the game that will be offered free next year on the Internet. It is one of the main efforts of the Our Courts Project that Justice O’Connor started in conjunction with Arizona State University and the Georgetown Law School. The game is being developed with James Gee, a professor at University of Wisconsin who studies the educational effect of video games.
The first episode of the game will revolve around “a T-shirt with a logo on it that high school students are passing around and want to wear,” Justice O’Connor said. “That will involve some kind of issue that involves a First Amendment question.”
Clothing and self-expression are of keen interest to students, the justice noted, and they have been a steady topic for the courts as well. Last year, for example, the Supreme Court ruled that a school principal could punish a student for displaying a banner that that read “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” at a school event.
Justice O’Connor didn’t describe the actual game play, but she said it will involve players taking different roles in a court argument.