How a public library’s summer game took over Ann Arbor, Mich. : NPR
The Hautamaki family (Shannon, on the left, Ian, Graham and Bret) pose outside the Pittsfield branch of the Ann Arbor district, where they have collected points for the summer match.
Neda Ulaby
hide
tilting legend
Neda Ulaby
Summer for thousands of people in Ann Arbor, Michigan, means recovering hidden codes in the city and reading books in a way to collect points. This is part of an extremely popular game which was a triumph for the public library that executes it.
“This summer, we have 16,000 active players and more than half of them are adults,” said director of the Library Eli Neiburger. Not bad for a library that serves around 150,000 people. It is such a local feeling, a couple even married by playing what is known in town under the name of “The Summer Game”.
The summer game started as a reading challenge, but it did not work very well, says Neirger. Children who did not like to read were going to pass the number of books required to get points, then would be for the summer. Children who read long pounds do not want to get the same number of points as those who read short.
Thus, around 2011, the library decided to rotate. “Instead of a reading game, we launched a game using libraries,” said Neirger. “This includes reading, going to events, the use of our website, the discovery of all the things that the library has to offer. And it has managed beyond our wildest dreams.”
The design of the summer game, he said, was inspired by business loyalty programs such as Coke Rewards. Users earn points by solving puzzles, learning local history and exploring neighborhoods. The points can be exchanged in the library shop for t-shirts, umbrellas and other goods, such as a very popular plush animal which is updated each year. (Animal 2025 is a small flamingo with glasses.)
A summer game kiosk outside the Traverwood branch of the Ann Arbor district library
Neda Ulaby
hide
tilting legend
Neda Ulaby
“I certainly did not expect how intensely it would be for adults,” added Neirger. Women in fifty and sixty are overrepresented among the players in the summer game, he noted, which reflects the demography of the users of the library. He wanted to use the summer game to raise awareness that the library can be used to borrow tools, art and music as well as books, and that it offers help for homework, to find jobs and provides a third space for conferences and crafts.
“Parks and RECs are not only baseball, baseball, baseball,” he said. “Why should a library be read, read, read?” The summer game reflects a philosophy of meeting with customers where they are. And its code is open access, so that any library can download it.
According to Raymond Garcia, spokesperson for the American Library Association, the popularity of the summer game of the Ann Arbor district library stands out, but is not singular. In an email, he said that the Public Library of Anne Arundel County in Maryland had a 10% participation rate of the population of the last census of his program “Summer @ Your Library”, including gameplay and frequentation of events, according to a library director. Dover’s librarians, Ohio, have created a Pokémon style card collection program. Called “Reading Dragons and Friends”, it is available for other libraries.
“The libraries are magical,” said Neiburger. “It is something that would not be authorized to be created today if it did not already exist. And for most communities, the library is one of the most popular government institutions. And for [local governments] To be able to go outside and kiss their communities and find an completely new audience that they did not know that they were reaching, and for these audiences to discover public services that were at their disposal that they did not know, it is also magic. “”
