"Good Morning. You All Have an F." - The Multiplayer Classroom: Designing Coursework as a Game - page 4

once the university s stadium, the site of the Little 500 bicycle race featured in

the film Breaking Away .

'

Figure 1.1
Indiana University Arboretum.

Not only did the Arboretum welcome my woolgathering when I turned bleary-
eyed from the computer to refresh both sight and mind, but it also served as a
primary location in the first alternate reality game I designed while at IU. That
red clock with its eclectic repertoire of chimes, those stone gazebos, bronze
statuary

—

all would take on greater significance in the story of mystery and
mayhem we told. More about that later.

Not all aspects of college life were welcome to this refugee from the real world.
The bureaucracy can grind as slowly as a limestone wheel, at times crushing
ideas and new initiatives beneath its weight. Faculty meetings at times reduced
my reasonable, intelligent, witty human colleagues to priests droning in what
seemed like a dead language with arcane rituals only the academy understands.
And, of course, grading. Grading. I m haunted by the first class I ever taught at

IU; that attempt at grading where I gave letter grades based not on percentages,
but feelings, and then tried desperately to translate them into real numbers. My
poor students. The tears. The horror.

'