Second Chance Game: local (university-community) partnerships for global awareness and responsibility

This paper reviews the evolution of an inter-organizational partnership between Ball State University and local organizations to develop the Second Chance Game (SCG), an environmental education sustainability awareness game that has been tested with sixth grade students in Muncie, Indiana and that has become a part of the educational program of the Minnetrista Cultural Center and Oakhurst Gardens. The SCG game helps students discover how to live responsibly on the land, and to understand that every decision they make (to obtain and process food, mine or harvest resources, build shelters, produce and consume products) has an impact on local and regional systems and resource-flows. In this paper, partnerships are presented as a strategy to help organizations deal with similar challenges and also as a strategy to increase global awareness about environmental issues and to build environmental responsibility. The authors discuss partnerships using the SCG as a case study. First, the authors review the process of formation, evolution, and maintenance of the partnership to design the SCG game and other components. They then present the game and a stand-alone preparatory program for middle school teachers to help their students play the game, as specific products. The paper closes with a reflection about the potential of partnerships for sustainable development initiatives between universities and local stakeholders.