Freestanding Graduate Courses
and Certificate in Transformative Game Design.

The Transformative Play Initiative at Uppsala University’s Department of Game Design is offering four (4) freestanding graduate-level courses in Autumn 2022-Spring 2023! These courses focus on the applied use of analog role-playing games as vehicles for personal and social change, whether facilitated in-person or in online environments. The courses are online, half-time, and freestanding. Anyone with a Bachelor’s degree can apply for the courses and take them from anywhere in the world.

The Transformative Play Initiative at Uppsala University’s Department of Game Design is offering four (4) freestanding graduate-level courses in Autumn 2022-Spring 2023!

These courses focus on the applied use of analog role-playing games as vehicles for personal and social change, whether facilitated in-person or in online environments. The courses are online, half-time, and freestanding. Anyone with a Bachelor’s degree can apply for the courses and take them from anywhere in the world.

Students who complete all four (4) courses in order with passing grades are eligible for a Certificate in Transformative Game Design. The courses are:

  1. Introduction to Transformative Game Design

  2. Transformative Game Design 1 (Design Focus)

  3. Transformative Game Design 2 (Implementation Focus)

  4. Cultivating Transformational Communities

Ideally, our students plan to work or are employed in helping professions, such as educators, therapists, social workers, community leaders, coaches, camp counselors, spiritual guides, etc. We especially welcome students to apply who have some background in role-playing games as designers, facilitators, and/or participants.

To learn more about the individual courses and the certificate track, click this link.

The application period begins March 15 and closes April 19. This year the application needs to go through the Swedish website. For more information, read about the application process here.

If you have further questions after reading the information in the link, please contact our study advisor, Stephanie Noroozy at gamedesign@speldesign.uu.se.

Testimonials:

“The Transformative Game Design program has had profound impact on my professional work. Individual change is difficult; culture change is even more so. This is especially true for a large, complex company with globally distributed teams. By infusing my design and strategy work with transformative play concepts, I’ve been able to influence mindset, perspective, and behavior shifts at scale. I can imagine all kinds of exciting applications to transform change management and organizational development initiatives using a more human and playful lens.” — Gabe Sopocy, 2022-2023 Certificate Track