Play in Higher Education: Is There Something Going On?

The public conversations about higher education focus on the relevancy of the curriculum, dropping enrollment, political polarization, and disengaged students. 

And yet, there is something playful afoot in the university…

In classrooms, offices, and grassy quads, educators and students are experimenting with improvisation, gaming, and artistic and cultural practices in ways that de-alienate teaching and learning.

In this Play, Development and Social Justice webinar, Carrie Lobman and Luke Perone will shine a light on what is emerging. Join them and academic activists from The Learning Planet, Professors at Play and CounterPlay for a dialogue that engages and explores how we are creating playful, developmental and equitable environments in universities around the world.

Join us and help create a public conversation that is practical, playful, and potentially transformative.

Leader Biographies

Carrie Lobman is a sociocultural scholar and play movement leader. She is the Leader of Education and Research at the East Side Institute and associate professor in the department of Learning and Teaching at the Graduate School of Education at Rutgers University. She facilitates the Institute's "Play, Development and Social Justice" webinar series and co-leads the International Class, its flagship program. She serves as a mentor to emerging performance activists around the world and is on the national board of directors of the All Stars Project. Carrie is the co-author or co-editor of three books: Unscripted Learning: Using Improvisation across the K-8 Curriculum, Big Ideas and Revolutionary Activity: Selected Essays, Talks and Articles by Lois Holzman and Performance and Play: Play and Culture Series, Volume 11.

Luke Perone is a faculty member in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts and Sciences at the University of Washington Tacoma where he teaches courses in human development and life-span imaginative play. He is also an associate of The East Side Institute and is a long-standing builder of its international performance movement. His research, teaching, and activism include the power of imaginative play, improvisational theater, performance activism, social therapeutics, humanitarian clowning, and socially-engaged arts to create revolutionary opportunities for learning, development, and community building. He co-edited (with Carrie Lobman) Big Ideas and Revolutionary Activity: Selected Talks, Essays, and Articles by Lois Holzman and is the editor of the forthcoming book Improvising With and In Higher Education: All Together Now for the series Palgrave Studies in Play, Performance, Learning and Development. He received his doctorate in educational psychology from the University of Illinois Chicago and his training in social therapeutics from the East Side Institute.

Panelist Biographies

Celiane Camargo-Borges, Ph.D. is a faculty member at Breda University of Applied Sciences in the Netherlands, where she bridges psychology, social innovation, design thinking, and creative leadership to inspire transformative learning and social change. As part of the Transversal Sustainability Transitions research group, Celiane, a Brazilian living in the global north, draws on her diverse background to connect multiple worldviews and perspectives. Guided by the pluriverse, she employs constructionist theory and design thinking to cultivate more participatory, inclusive formats for learning and innovation. She has published extensively, contributing to major collections such as The SAGE Handbook of Social Constructionist Practice, The Handbook of Arts-Based Research (Guilford Press), and The Handbook for Creative Futures (Routledge).

Lisa K. Forbes, PhD is a co-founder of Professors at Play. She is an Assistant Clinical Professor in the Counseling Program at the University of Colorado Denver. Lisa is a Licensed Professional Counselor and a Play Therapist. Her research centers around intensive mothering practices, gender conformity, and mental health and…you guessed it, play and fun in teaching and learning!

Mathias Poulsen, Ph.D. is a postdoctoral researcher at Lab for Play and Design, Design School Kolding, Denmark. His research engages with the difficulties of living well together, for both humans and more-than humans. He is particularly interested in play as a mode of democratic participation with the potential to expand our democratic imaginaries. Mathias is a self-proclaimed play activist, who founded the international play festival ‘CounterPlay’ to cultivate safe, trusting spaces and communities for exploring and sustaining play.

Ed Stevenette manages international youth engagement projects at The Learning Planet Institute in Paris, a centre for researching and learning to tackle global challenges. He notably coordinates the Learning Planet Youth Design Challenge, an annual competition that invites young people to design learning programs for their ideal university. Additionally, Ed oversees the Learning Planet Youth Fellows community, uniting  young individuals worldwide passionate about rethinking education. At heart, he is deeply committed to creating learning experiences to impact and improve education systems.

David Thomas, Ph.D is a co-founder of Professors at Play. He is the Executive Director of Online Programs at the University of Denver and Assistant Professor Attendant in the Department of Architecture at the University of Colorado Denver. His research centers around fun, fun objects (like buildings!) and the meaning of play.