The Education Market: VR’s Best Hope? at XR for Change Summit
2019-06-17 08:00 - 17:00 (America/New_York)
On Monday, June 17, the Joan Ganz Cooney Center presents a panel discussion at the XR for Change Summit in New York City.

For years, experts have been predicting that immersive technologies like AR and VR are on the cusp of breaking into the mainstream market. But despite the dazzling experiences that users may encounter when they first try a VR headset, industry reports suggest there continue to be signs of instability in the hardware marketplace, and that consumer demand hasn’t been as strong as anticipated. Perhaps the classroom is where AR and VR will really shine.

Children are enthusiastic about AR and VR, and teachers have expressed greater engagement around lessons that incorporate immersive media. But is it safe? How are these technologies being deployed in the classroom – are teachers receiving the training and support they need to implement successful lessons? What happens when the novelty wears off? And as AR and VR continue to gain traction in the education marketplace, how can we ensure equitable access to these learning experiences for all students?

View the full agenda for the XR for Change Summit.

CSforALL Summit 2019
2019-10-21 - 2019-10-23
The CSforALL Summit is a multi-day convening focused on rigorous, inclusive and sustainable computer science for all US students. There will be two plenary sessions where you will hear from both local and national stakeholders impacting systems change within CS education and highlighting their 2019 commitments. This year’s event takes place in Salt Lake City, Utah from October 21-23, 2019.

The Joan Ganz Cooney Center’s Executive Director Michael Preston will lead “Leveraging Public Media to Inspire All Kids to See Themselves in Tech,” a fireside chat with Debra Sanchez from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Milton Chen, senior fellow and executive director emeritus of the George Lucas Educational Foundation during the Systems for CS session on Tuesday, October 22.

View the full agenda

The Common Sense Census: Media Use by Tweens and Teens 2019
2019-10-29 09:00 - 11:00
The Common Sense Census: Media Use by Tweens and Teens 2019, an update to the 2015 study, is a big-picture look at how young people in America are engaging with media and explores differences by race, gender and socioeconomic status. The study reveals a huge increase in the amount of time tweens and teens are spending watching online videos and using devices for homework, even as the digital divide persists.

Please join Common Sense for a presentation of this research, followed by a panel discussion with child development experts, researchers, and educators, about how tweens’ and teens’ daily lives are affected by media and technology at home, at school, and in their communities.

The event will take place at Sesame Workshop at 9am on Tuesday, October 20, 2019.

Featured SpeakersJames P. Steyer, founder and CEO, Common Sense
Anya Kamenetz, author and education correspondent, NPR
Michael Preston, Executive Director of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center
Vicky Rideout, VJR Consulting
Michael Robb, senior director of research, Common Sense
LaVerne Srinivasan, vice president, national program and program director, education, Carnegie Corporation of New York
Emily Weinstein, postdoctoral research fellow, Harvard Graduate
School of Education

Register here
There is no charge to attend, but seats are limited and advance registration is required.

2020 NETA Conference & CPB Public Media Thought Leader Forum
2020-01-26 - 2020-01-30 | Arlington, VA
The NETA Conference and CPB Public Media Thought Leader Forum is dedicated to the foundational cornerstone of Public Media: Education. Attendees represent station leadership, education, community engagement, marketing, promotion, production and content to learn from national thought leaders and engage in hands-on discussions. This year the conference will explore the future of education and media, with a focus on the following areas: Media in the Classroom, Content, Community Engagement, Station Management, and Youth Voices.

The Joan Ganz Cooney Center will share highlights from our Families Learning Across Boundaries (FamLAB) Project with representatives from PBS SoCAL and Idaho Public Television, who were on project teams that were recipients of our Spark Grant awards.

Future of Childhood Summit
2020-03-03 - 2020-03-05 | San Francisco, CA
Event postponed

After much deliberation, the Future of Childhood Summit has been postponed. The planning team at Joan Ganz Cooney Center and Google are disappointed not to be able to host the Summit this March.We will share more details as soon as we are able to do so.

The Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and Google will convene a Summit aimed at realizing our most positive visions of childhood in this tech-saturated age. This invitation-only event will bring together leaders from industry, research, education, and advocacy to create a unified vision of the future of childhood, in which all children grow up in a world where their interactions with media and technology enrich their learning, wellbeing, and safety. The summit will kick off on the evening of March 3 with an opening session and reception followed by two days of conversation and hands-on planning. We will reflect on how to nurture, empower and protect children while building new skills. The summit will be an opportunity to engage in discussion across industries and disciplines, and also develop a shared agenda for the decade ahead.

The Future of Free Play in the Digital World
2020-11-20 08:00 - 17:00
On World Children’s Day, November 20, 2020, the Digital Futures Commission will launch ‘The future of free play in the digital world.’

The work of the Digital Futures Commission will be introduced by Baroness Beeban Kidron, 5Rights Foundation, followed by a panel discussion chaired by Professor Sonia Livingstone OBE, London School of Economics, with Ann Phoenix, Kate Cowan, and Chris Batemen, to mark #WorldChildrensDay. They will introduce Digital Futures with a panel exploring the future of free play in the digital world.

November 20, 2020 11:00 AM-12 PM GMT (6:00 AM EST)

Register: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_gxTYaQ-3TPiUsaLHX37-GQ

Reframing Education for the 22nd Century
2021-04-07
2020 was a year unlike any we have experienced before … until 2021. We have witnessed the “hoaxification” of the COVID-19 pandemic, massive civic unrest in response to long-tolerated systemic racism and injustice, continued denial of climate change in spite of an increasingly inhospitable natural environment, and most recently, a violent insurrection seeking to disrupt democracy and encourage authoritarianism.At the root of these issues is more than a conflict between change and the status quo: it’s the difference between equitable and sustainable societies and life-threatening imbalances in power and privilege.One critical challenge is that our education systems are fundamentally designed to advance individualistic goals over collective success. Even “21st century skills,” such as collaboration and communication, are implemented in ways that fall short of their goals. As educators, we have a moral imperative to rethink our work so that children are prepared to bend, if not upend, the arc of history toward progress for the common good.Education should foster in each and every child an egalitarian mindset — a positive sense of oneself as a worthy individual rooted in valued cultural traditions, able and disposed to construct a view of reality from multiple perspectives and act in collaboration with others toward the common good. To develop an egalitarian mindset, we might consider these questions:
School climate and culture: What features of present-day school structures and cultures should students never or rarely experience?

Pedagogy, Curriculum and Assessment: What about current teachers and teaching, curriculum, and assessment should students never or rarely experience?

Technology: What should be the normative experience of every child with regard to technology, including AI? What should they never or rarely experience?
How would these changes lead to egalitarian mindsets?The Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop and the Center for Global Education at Asia Society invite you to participate in a series of provocative conversations with the goal of reframing the purpose of education as the foundation for a social movement toward equality and sustainability. We hope that you will join us.Dates: Wednesday, April 7, 14, and 28 (Skipping April 21)
Time: 1 PM US EDT for 75 minutes
Format: A weekly series of salons encouraging the free flow of ideas around how to build an education system for the 22nd century focused on the common good. In partnership with

The Missing Middle: Reimagining a Future for Tweens, Teens, and Public Media
2021-05-25 13:00 - 14:00
Tuesday, May 25, 2021
1:00 PM ET

Today’s tweens and teens feel they have outgrown the programming offered by public media as they begin to discover a world of information and entertainment at their fingertips. Yet even though they have access to an abundance of options for watching, listening, playing, and communicating, they are often underserved by quality content appropriate to their developmental stages and needs.

The Joan Ganz Cooney Center and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting have partnered to better understand how young people are engaging with media today. As part of our By/With/For Youth: Inspiring Next Gen Public Media Audiences project, we spoke with 50 tweens and teens across the U.S. about how they spend their time, what they find interesting, how they find new shows, apps, or videos, what issues are important to them, as well as what misconceptions adults have about youth. We asked them for their advice about what media producers should do if they want to engage with people their age, and we talked about how their lives have changed during the pandemic.

Please join us as we discuss our findings to be published in our forthcoming report, The Missing Middle: Reimagining a Future for Tweens, Teens, and Public Media on Tuesday, May 25 at 1pm. This event is free and open to the public.Learn more and register here»

Speakers:

Monica Bulger, Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop

Mimi Ito, Director, Connected Learning Lab, University of California, Irvine

Mary Madden, Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop

Michael Preston, Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop

Debra Sanchez, Corporation for Public Broadcasting

Next Gen Public Media Accelerator RFP Info Session
2021-11-08 13:00 - 15:00
Public media professionals are invited to join us for this one-hour information session about the Next Gen Public Media Accelerator RFP. The session will focus on the purpose of the RFP, an overview of its guiding priorities, the key activities that will happen during the Next Gen Public Media Accelerator, and opportunities for potential applicants to ask questions about the opportunity.
Monday, Nov. 8, 202
1:00 PM ET

View the session recording here.

Next Gen Public Media Concept Design Sprint
2021-11-10
This two-hour interactive workshop will help applicants transform their aspirations into compelling proposal concepts. Facilitated by Cooney Center project leaders, applicants will engage in design exercises that help generate ideas that align with Next Gen Public Media Accelerator goals and expectations.

View agenda

Wednesday, November 10, 2021
1:00- 3:00 PM ET
Register here

Next Gen Public Media Concept Design Sprint
2021-11-12 13:00 - 15:00
This two-hour interactive workshop will help applicants transform their aspirations into compelling proposal concepts. Facilitated by Cooney Center project leaders, applicants will engage in design exercises that help generate ideas that align with Next Gen Public Media Accelerator goals and expectations.

View agenda

Friday, Nov. 12, 2021
1:00 – 3:00 PM ET

Register here.

Dust or Magic Asimolar
2022-06-03 08:00 - 2022-06-05 17:00 | Venue Monterey, CA, Monterey, CA
Dust or Magic Asimolar is an opportunity for participants to catch up on the current state of children’s media, in one of the most beautiful locations in the world by way of talks, laser critiques and demos. Dust or Magic has a long tradition of deep dive conversations and honest critiques in a commercial-free setting. Participants leave with a sense of where things have been, and where they are going framed in child development theory. Watch this overview video from previous Dust or Magic events at Asilomar.

The Cooney Center is proud to present the Playtest with Kids toolkit at Dust or Magic.

Playtest with Kids
2022-09-08
Please join the Children’s Media Association of the Bay Area and the Joan Ganz Cooney Center for a one-hour virtual event featuring the Playtest with Kids toolkit. The free interactive resource features methods and case studies to help teams get actionable insights when playtesting their products with children. We’ll talk with experts who will share what they’ve learned about how to effectively gather insights from kids (including remotely!) and how playtesting has impacted their product design. Come prepared to learn and to ask questions!
Thursday, September 8, 2022
2:30 pm PT / 5:30 pm ET
Please see the Children’s Media Association site for details.

Group Chat: Teens and Adults in Conversation at Media Literacy Week 2022
2022-10-25 - 2022-10-27
As part of U.S. National Media Literacy Week, please join the Cooney Center and NAMLE for a “premiere” presentation of three conversations between experts and youth around topics in youth digital culture, moderated by educator Dwight Dunston. Together, adults and teens explore issues like what kids are watching online, where they get their news, how they maintain a sense of well-being in the digital world, and what it’s like to collaborate with public media professionals to produce content. We hope you and your colleagues will log on and join us live! Registration is free.

Group Chat: Adolescent Well-being Online
Tuesday, October 25, 12:00 pm ET
It’s no secret that teens are deeply immersed in online spaces – for better and for worse. How do their online activities impact their well-being? Emily Weinstein and Carrie James from Project Zero surveyed 3,500 teens to understand how youth today must navigate their digital lives. Next Gen Public Media Youth Fellows Faiza Ashar and Jaden Thompson share their own perspectives as young people who are trying to figure things out for themselves.

Group Chat: Youth Creators in Public Media
Wednesday, October 26, 12:00 pm ET
Public media stations around the country are offering unique opportunities for young people to produce content. In this Group Chat, teens from WNET’s Youth Collective “Amplify Series” and MPB’s Student Council Podcast join Hannah Dawe (WNET, public media station in New York City) and Jasmine Harvey (Mississippi Public Broadcasting) to give us the scoop on what it’s like behind the scenes when adults and youth collaborate in the studio.Group Chat: Youth Digital Culture
Thursday, October 27, 12:00 pm ET
What do young people really think about what they’re seeing online? Monica Anderson (Pew Research Center) and Joan Mukogosi (Data & Society) chat with Next Gen Public Media Youth Fellows Gabby Rodriguez and Audrey Gage about the platforms they use, how they find community online, and where they get their news.

Register for these sessions and more at the 2022 U.S. Media Literacy Week event site.

FOSI 2022 Annual Conference: Trust & Assurance: Online Safety in an Uncertain World
2022-11-14
This year’s FOSI conference convenes the best online safety thinkers, practitioners, and experts from around the world for high-level discussions and debates, engaging networking opportunities, and a first-class exhibition of online safety technologies, products, and services. Attendees will have the chance to explore topics such as content moderation, privacy policies and practices, safety in the metaverse, digital wellbeing, and much more.

Cooney Center Executive Director Michael Preston will speak at a morning breakout session at 11:30am, “Inside a Child’s Mind: Tech Use Through the Formative Years,” with Rebecca Parlakian (Zero to Three), Dr. Michael Rich (Digital Wellness Lab, Boston Children’s Hospital), and Dr. Ellen Selkie (University of Washington).

Learn more about the conference and register here.

Gen Z in the Room: Making Public Media By and With Youth for the Future
2023-01-18 13:00 - 14:00
Please join the Joan Ganz Cooney Center on January 18, 2023 for a special presentation celebrating our forthcoming publication, Gen Z in the Room. This report summarizes insights from 30 in-depth interviews with stakeholders involved in public media youth projects across the country. The report documents what public media stations have learned from these youth projects over time. By looking at the various ways participants have thought about, approached, and experimented with youth engagement, the public media system can develop more thoughtful strategies for serving and platforming this missing middle audience. We look forward to sharing highlights and discussing takeaways with you.January 18, 2023
1:00 pm-2:00 pm ET via Zoom
Register here

From Surviving To Thriving In A Digital World: A Safer Internet Day Chat
2023-02-07
The National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE) and The Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop are teaming up to host a webinar and Facebook Live Event with adult and youth experts for Safer Internet Day on Tuesday, February 7, 2023 (4:00 pm – 5:30 pm EST). “From Surviving To Thriving In A Digital World: A Safer Internet Day Chat” will be a conversation about the importance of designing online experiences with kids’ well-being in mind, including providing insights from young people on what they need in order to thrive when their lives are digital by default.To register to attend the webinar, visit shorturl.at/dBKW9 Watch the event live on Facebook Live (No registration required) on the National Association for Media Literacy Education’s (NAMLE) page at facebook.com/medialiteracyed.

SXSW 2023
2023-03-10 - 2023-03-11
The Joan Ganz Cooney Center is thrilled to participate in two sessions at SXSW 2023 this March. If you’re in Austin, we invite you to join us at the JW Marriott on March 10 and 11th.
Designing Tech for Children’s Well-Being
There has been a great deal of conversation about technology’s potential harms for children. But what does well-being for children in the digital age look like? Can we design digital experiences that allow children to learn emotional regulation, develop competence and creativity, feel empowered and self-actualized, and connect with others in a diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment, while also keeping them safe? We will discuss the Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children (RITEC) project—a global, multi-stakeholder, and cross-sectoral initiative that aims (1) to create a framework that maps how the design of children’s digital experiences affects their well-being, and (2) to provide guidance as to how informed design choices can promote positive well-being outcomes.
March 10 | 2:30 pm CST | JW Marriott Salon 7-8

Designing for Digital Thriving
How can we create & foster healthy, inclusive digital spaces that enable individuals and communities to thrive? Riot Games, the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, the Fair Play Alliance & IDEO came together to host an Open Innovation Challenge to champion responsible design practices that foster healthy, inclusive communities in a rapidly changing digital world. By learning how to intentionally design online spaces with digital thriving in mind, we believe that anyone can help individuals, groups, & communities truly thrive in today’s connected world. No matter what industry you’re a part of, we invite you to share in our vision of creating a thriving digital world for all.
March 11 | 11:30 am CST | JW Marriott Salon 7-8

We also invite SXSW participants to take a break in the LEGO Play Lounge in Room 403 of the JW Marriott on March 10. Recharge and play with us!

Designing Tech for Kids' Well-Being at ASU+GSV 2023
2023-04-18 | San Diego, CA
What does well-being for children in the digital age look like? A growing movement acknowledges that it’s not enough to worry about technology’s potential harm to children; it is time to be more intentional about designing for positive outcomes. How can we design digital experiences that allow children to learn emotional regulation, develop competence and creativity, feel empowered and self-actualized, and connect with others in a diverse, equitable, and inclusive environment while keeping them safe? We will discuss recent research exploring the links between games and well-being, the value of child-centered design, and insights from the Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children (RITEC) and Digital Thriving projects that offer guidance to developers looking for ways to create digital experiences that promote positive well-being for young people.
Michael Preston (Executive Director, Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop) will moderate a panel with Bruce Homer (Professor, “The Graduate Center, CUNY”), Elizabeth Milovidov (Global Digital Child Safety Lead, The LEGO Group), Natasha Miller (Senior Research Scientist II, Blizzard Entertainment / Fair Play Alliance)
Date & Time: Tuesday 4/18, 2:30 – 3:10 PM PT
Location: Harbor I, Level 2
Channel: K-12 Transformation Learn more

Co-designing the Digital Future with Kids, for Kids
2023-09-27
What’s the secret to creating digital media products for kids that makes learning engaging and fun? We’ve found that including kids throughout the design process has many benefits: it empowers kids who find that their opinions are valued; designers gain a fresh perspective from the audience they’re creating for; and the product itself is often more impactful as a result.On Wednesday, September 27, the Cooney Center hosted a webinar to discuss the Cooney Center Sandbox with some of our partners, including The GIANT Room, KidsTeam, Oko Labs, Mrs Wordsmith, and the Scratch Foundation. We talked about methods, balancing business interests with research-informed goals, and how teams have implemented findings from sessions with children into their product designs.For more information about working with us, please contact us here.

Speakers:

Michael Preston is the Executive Director of the Joan Ganz Cooney Center, an independent research and innovation lab within Sesame Workshop that advances positive futures for kids in the digital world. The Center conducts research on emerging technologies and collaborates with technologists, digital media producers, and educators to support young people’s learning and well-being. Michael has 25 years of experience leading educational innovation and technology programs in K-12, university, and informal learning contexts. His work focuses on child-centered approaches to design, new models for teaching and learning, and systemic change at local and national levels. He co-founded CSforALL, the hub for the national Computer Science for All movement, and led digital learning initiatives at the NYC Department of Education, Columbia University, and New Visions for Public Schools. He earned a PhD in Cognitive Science in Education from Teachers College, Columbia University and a BA from Harvard College.

Medha Tare is an experienced researcher in the learning sciences and technology area. Her work centers on addressing the needs of the whole child, including considering individual differences among learners, their environments, and the media through which they learn. Prior to the Joan Ganz Cooney Center at Sesame Workshop, she was the Director of Research for the Learner Variability Project at Digital Promise, where she developed public resources on the cognitive, socio-emotional, and background factors that impact children and adults’ learning. This work involved research translation, science communication, and studies of educational efficacy with school districts and edtech product developers. She has also served as a Learning Sciences Exchange Fellow through New America, working across sectors to promote early learning and help young children and their families thrive. Medha earned her PhD in Developmental Psychology at the University of Michigan and her BA in Cognitive Science and English at Rutgers University. She has served as an advisor on national and international educational initiatives and has numerous peer-reviewed publications including in the Journal of Research on Technology in Education, Language Learning and Technology, and Journal of Cognition and Development. With

Elizabeth Bonsignore is an assistant research professor in the University of Maryland’s College of Information Studies and Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL). Her research explores the design of interactive play and social experiences that promote new media literacies, arts-integrated science learning, and participatory culture. She co-designs and advocates with youth, families, and local communities with the goal of including and empowering youth historically underrepresented in STEM/computing to advance in these fields.

Tif Gagnon is the Design Director at Scratch Foundation with over 15 years of experience in the EdTech sector. She believes in the power of creative learning and strives to combine her skills and passions to support making Scratch accessible and engaging for all learners around the world.

Chris Garrity is a developer and product manager with the Scratch Foundation (and formerly the Lifelong Kindergarten Group at the MIT Media Lab). She has many years of experience building tools, designing playful activities, and facilitating hands-on workshops to introduce creative coding to children and educators with Scratch and ScratchJr. She is passionate about lowering the barriers to learning to code through providing developmentally appropriate tools in the learners own language, and by making the tools more inclusive and accessible.

Azadeh Jamalian is founder and CEO of The GIANT Room creative STEM organization, helping the next generation of creatives and inventors to think big and act on their most ambitious ideas. Jamalian is a TED speaker, former head of education strategy at littleBits, and co-founder of Tiggly. She has a proven record of designing learning products and programs that millions of children have engaged with, and thousands of schools have implemented in their programs. Through her work at The GIANT Room, they have provided creative STEM programs to more than 30,000 families in person and online, and through their partnership with schools, museums, libraries, and cultural organizations such as TED Ed and Joan Ganz Cooney Center. She has a PhD in cognitive studies in education from Teachers College, and has publications on a broad range of topics such as designing learning platforms for children, emerging educational tech, game design, mathematical education, and cognition.

Pierre Lagrange is Executive Chairman of Huntsman and Mrs Wordsmith. Before acquiring Huntsman in 2014 and Mrs Wordsmith in 2021, Pierre co-founded GLG Partners, acquired by Man Group in 2010, and sat on Man Group executive committee. Before founding GLG, Pierre worked at Goldman Sachs from 1990, where he managed global equity portfolios. He started his career in finance at JP Morgan, where from 1985 he worked in government bond sales and trading. Pierre holds an MA in Engineering from Solvay Business School in Brussels.Pierre has regularly invested in movie productions, executive producer of Kickass and Hollywood blockbusters Kingsman: The Secret Service and the sequel, Kingsman: The Golden Circle

Matt Miller, Co-Founder and CEO of Oko Labs, is a seasoned technologist, product leader, and business strategist in the education space. Oko is a dynamic AI-powered platform that enables small group differentiation in elementary classrooms through collaborative games, enhancing academic progress and social-emotional development for every student in an inclusive and personalized way. Prior to founding Oko Labs, Matt served as Chief Technology Officer and VP of Labs at Amplify Education, and VP of Product at Flatiron School. Matt is also an active consultant, mentor, and advisor in the education technology sector, with a deep background in AI, Machine Learning, and Information Security. Matt holds BS and MS degrees in Computer Science from Columbia University with a focus on Intelligent Systems.

Lady San Pedro is Director of Business Innovation at Mrs Wordsmith. With a solid background in product design, Lady has led the creation of Mrs Wordsmith’s extensive and award-winning print catalog of children’s literacy books. As the company expanded into the digital sphere, Lady has taken the reins in developing Planet Agora: a gamified chat app designed to foster social-emotional development in kids aged 8-13.

Creating Digital Play for Children’s Well-Being: From Research to Design
2024-06-26
The Cooney Center and the NYU Create Lab are organizing an afternoon of learning and play on June 26 at the NYU Create Lab in Brooklyn. We will dive into the findings from new research from the Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children Initiative (RITEC), which looks at how digital design choices impact the well-being of kids, and explore how to apply these insights in a business environment.

Shuli Gilutz from UNICEF will introduce the RITEC project and why it is important to children

Jan Plass and Bruce Homer from NYU CREATE Lab will share results from their research with kids around the world

Pia Breum Corlin from the LEGO Group and Lise Borgstrøm Henriksen and Ole Kjær Thomasen from the LEGO Foundation will discuss how they are approaching translating RITEC research into LEGO’s work

Everyone will have a chance to play!

For more information, please contact us at cooney.center@sesame.org

Speakers:

Michael PrestonJoan Ganz Cooney Center

Shuli GilutzUNICEF

Bruce HomerCUNY Graduate School

Jan PlassNYU

Sarah Jacobstein Joan Ganz Cooney Center

Pia Breum CorlinThe LEGO Group

Ole Kjær Thomasen The LEGO Foundation

Lise Borgstrøm HenriksenThe LEGO Foundation

Fabian FroehlichResearcher, NYU CREATE Lab

Yuli ShaoResearcher, NYU Create Lab

2024 Games for Change Festival
2024-06-27 - 2024-06-28
We’re so excited for the Games for Change Festival in just a few weeks! This amazing event is back at Parsons in NYC from June 27-28. We can’t wait to talk about the Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children (RITEC) initiative and the forthcoming Design Guide for Business with our colleagues from UNICEF and the LEGO Group.

On Friday, June 28, join Shuli Gilutz, Ph.D. for a keynote talk on the Main Stage at 10:00 AM:

Designing for Well-being in Digital Play – It’s possible! How can we design digital play for children, that supports and enhances their wellbeing? How can we go beyond safety to create games kids will thrive in? What’s between child rights and wellbeing and how can they be incorporated in the design process? UNICEF & the LEGO group share their findings.

Then at 2:00 PM, join us for How to Build Digital Play for Well-being, an interactive workshop with Michael Preston and Sarah Jacobstein from the Joan Ganz Cooney Center, Shuli Gilutz, Ph.D. from UNICEF, Pia Breum Corlin from the LEGO Group, Nikita Khalid from Scratch Foundation, and Grace Collins from Snowbright Studio. In this 90-minute workshop, participants will learn about the Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children (RITEC) initiative’s research findings on how digital play can impact children’s well-being. We will share guidance being developed to assist businesses in incorporating these findings into the games they design, along with case studies.

Mark your calendars and get your tickets at https://bit.ly/G4C2024_SPEAKER

Applying Principles of Well-being to Digital Design for Kids at Play Make Learn 2024
2024-07-17 - 2024-07-19
We are thrilled to be heading to Madison for the Play Make Learn conference from July 17-19, 2024.

Please join us for a panel where we will discuss our Well-Being by Design Fellowship, a professional development program for designers and producers of interactive kids’ technology and media to center children’s well-being in their products. Our goal is to develop a supportive ecosystem that encourages tech and media creators to design with children’s best interests in mind, ultimately fostering a safer, more engaging, and more enriching digital environment for kids with well-being at the center of the experience.Our inaugural cohort of fellows met regularly from January -April 2024 to explore different facets of well-being, including creativity, social connection, and empowerment and workshopped their own products with these principles in mind. The Cooney Center’s Senior Director of Research, Medha Tare, will lead a conversation with three of our fellows, Melissa Gedney (PBS Kids), Olivia Levenson Korchagin (Global Tinker), and Keeana Saxon, Esq. (Kidogo Productions) in a panel and interactive Q&A.

July 19, 2024
10am-11am
Multicultural Greek Council Room (4th Floor)

Celebrating Designing for Kids’ Well-Being – Case Studies from the 2025 WBxD Fellows
2025-05-22 12:00 - 13:15
In this special culminating webinar on May 22, 2025, our incredible cohort of Well-Being by Design (WBxD) Fellows shared how they are designing to support children’s well-being through interactive digital experiences.With products that span a target range from preschool to high school, and representing a spectrum from startups to big tech, from physical toys to virtual reality—these innovators are reimagining what it means to build for kids.Each of our fellows will present a brief case study on how they are embedding well-being into the design of a specific product or practice. You’ll walk away with actionable insights and fresh inspiration on how frameworks like Responsible Innovation in Technology for Children (RITEC) can guide the design of better digital experiences for young people.May 22, 2025 12:00 – 1:15 pm ET Meet the 2025 Fellows

Well-Being by Design 2026 Fellowship: Office Hours
2025-09-22 - 2025-10-02
The Joan Ganz Cooney Center’s Well-Being by Design Fellowship is a professional development program for designers and producers of interactive kids’ technology and media. This is a free program supported by Pinterest with no fee or cost to participate.

We are thrilled to announce a call for applications for our third year of the Well-being by Design Fellowship. We invite mid-career professionals who work in interactive kids’ technology and media to apply to join our five-month program, in which participants will workshop their current projects, network with other children’s technology and media designers, learn from industry leaders, and collaborate with a youth cohort for honest feedback. Boost your understanding of child-centered technology and media design concepts so you can create great products for young people.

If you are interested in applying but have questions, please join us for our upcoming office hours via Zoom.

Monday, September 22, 2025 at 12:00 pm EDT
Wednesday, October 1, 2025 at 12:00 pm EDT

Celebrating the 2026 Well-Being by Design Fellows
2026-05-19 12:00 - 13:00 | Virtual
You are invited to join the Joan Ganz Cooney Center for a virtual celebration of our 2026 Well-Being by Design Fellows on May 19, 2026 at 12:00pm ET.Over the past five months, this amazing group of designers, educators, and researchers has explored how to create digital experiences that truly support children’s well-being. At this culminating event, each fellow will present a case study from their project, offering an inside look at their design process, key insights, and the opportunities and challenges of building for kids in today’s digital landscape.Together, these presentations highlight a shared commitment to centering children’s needs from the earliest stages of product development. We hope you will join us to meet some of the emerging leaders shaping the future of children’s media and technology.

Meet our 2026 Fellows:

Alexandra (Allie) Dewey, DoSeum
Amber Ivey, AiDigiTales
Asante Asiedu, Udēēsa
Christopher Gomez, Bronx Children’s Museum
Kati Baker, Social Cipher
Mariya Nikolayev, Stride, Inc.
Sarah Kelley-Luker, Nurture
Tatyerra Spurlock-McPherson, Sesame Workshop
Téo Xisto, Lifelong Kindergarten Group
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