Newhouse School assistant professor of magazine Adam Peruta earned a “best of show” award in the Broadcast Education Association’s Festival of Media Arts’ Interactive Multimedia Competition in the Faculty Entertainment & Emerging Technologies category for the mobile app Traditions Challenge.
The app is a gamified experience for college students, encouraging them to participate in campus activities and traditions throughout their time at school—like a “bucket list” of things to do on and around campus before graduation.
The challenges cover activities and events from all aspects of the college experience: residence life, academics, athletics, musical/theatrical productions, off-campus activities and more. Students complete challenges by following the “how to complete” instructions provided for each item. As students complete the challenges, they earn points to win prizes, or “Traditions Keepers” mementos.
A real-time feed and leaderboard show students which challenges they’ve completed and where they stand against their classmates, while push notifications keep them apprised of upcoming events. Ultimately, the app helps serve as a record of a student’s time at school.
Only 18 “best of show” awards were awarded out of more than 1,450 entries in the competition. The award also comes with a $1,000 cash prize.
The app is currently being piloted at Ithaca College (available for download from the Apple iTunes store). Peruta is working on a launch at Syracuse University.
For more information, contact Peruta at 315.443.9245 or arperuta@syr.edu.
