Transforming Interdisciplinary Collaboration Through Game Design Workshop

Join Gillian Smith (Worcester Polytechnic Institute) and Anne Sullivan (York U) for two days of conversation, hands-on activities, and meals!

Interdisciplinary collaboration is essential—but often challenging. Institutional structures, disciplinary boundaries, and competing systems cause ongoing friction in partnerships. Game design, however, is fundamentally about orchestrating complex systems to work together in meaningful and constructive ways.
What might we discover if we examined interdisciplinary research collaboration through a game design lens?
This workshop invites participants to consider this question for two days of brainstorming and prototyping new and experimental ways that collaborative research systems can interact, align, and produce compelling outcomes!

Open to all researchers. No prior experience with game design required.

Thursday, April 16, 2026 – 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM
Day 1: Introductions, brainstorming, lunch, group formation and activities, group share out

Friday, April 17, 2026 – 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM
Day 2: Workshop group discussion, share out, and future visioning

RSVP HERE or by email to Helen Lee (helen2@yorku.ca)

Location: Sensorium Loft, Fourth Floor Joan and Martin Goldfarb Centre for Fine Arts, York University