"CyberCampus" Prospectus
March 1998
William F. Massy, Sally V. Massy, and Jesse H. Ausubel
"CyberCampus"
is a computer-based simulation game under development that targets both the
institutional professional and the interested layperson to participate in
leadership challenges in a college or university setting.[*] Players will set, monitor, and modify a variety of
institutional parameters and policies, allocate resources as they see fit, and
watch as results continually unfold. The game provides an opportunity to
experiment and succeed or fail in a safe and entertaining fantasy environment.
While CyberCampus is necessarily a caricature of real academic life, it is
grounded in authentic conceptual structures and data. It will provide serious
lessons in higher education.
The motivation for developing "CyberCampus" lies in the need for faculty,
administrators, trustees, students, government officials, and the public to
better understand colleges and universities as systems. Players will grapple
with issues such as:
- strategic positioning of the institution
- academic performance and faculty morale
- administrative and support service performance and staff morale
- incentives and rewards and their effect on productivity
- resource allocations among functions, academic departments, and types of expenditures
- tuition, financial aid, and overhead rates and their effects on student demand and sponsored research
- financial performance, including long-run financial equilibrium and management of capital assets and liabilities
- perceptions of students, research sponsors, donors, alumni, and members of the media
- comparative performance with respect to similar institutions
The game will be driven by a sophisticated simulation engine that models five
broad areas:
- resource allocation and finance;
- enrollment management;
- academic operations;
- physical plant activities;
- nonacademic operations.
As in real life, resource allocation drives much of what goes on in the
player-generated institution. However, "CyberCampus" extends far beyond
financial functions. For example, the enrollment management module models
students' application and enrollment decisions. The academic operations module
covers students' choices of fields and courses and their effects on faculty
staffing, course supply, and the utilization of faculty discretionary time. The
model also includes sponsored research where applicable. The physical plant
module covers building construction and maintenance. Nonacademic operations
include student life, athletics, fundraising, libraries, and information
technology support. Data to drive the models have collected from various
government and private sources.
The game's target market will be, broadly, anyone with an interest in how
colleges and universities work as systems and, more specifically:
- higher education administrators
- faculty, especially those in leadership roles (e.g., department chairs)
- trustees
- education analysts, writers, and policymakers
- students of higher education, and in general
- alumni and interested public
"CyberCampus" will be sold to institutions for use in connection with retreats
and training programs as well as to individuals.
The Jackson Hole Higher Education Group, Inc., has developed the game's
conceptual structure and simulation engine with assistance from the Forum for
the Future of Higher Education and support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
and the Spencer Foundation. The final product is being designed and developed
by Hong Kong's Enlight Software with Sloan support. Decisions about publication
are pending. "CyberCampus" is scheduled for release in 1999.
For further information, contact Jesse Ausubel of the Sloan Foundation:
212.649.1650; ausubel@rockvax.rockefeller.edu
[*] The working title "CyberCampus" may be
changed before the game comes to market.
