Game Grad School

Rachel CassinatDIY Health Intervention

NTR 598October 30th, 2013

Why did I do what I did?• I like to-do lists• ...but moreover, I love crossing things off of them• Lately, feeling very “stuck”• Left me feeling unaccomplished• Shifted my productivity

– Low priority items to feel more in control– All of it left in an unhealthy relationship with my health-related

program...and myself• I knew this was what I wanted to change

– Hyper-journaling validated this

• Overall goal: Feel more accomplished towards my degree, and increase my productivity

Gaming Grad School/Attack your Day

• About the same time I was feeling “stuck”, I read– Gaming Grad School by Katy Meyers

• Grad student by week, video gamer by weekend“Perhaps the problem with graduate school, like the problem in

many bad video games, are the mechanics...If we look at the game mechanics that make games successful, we can approach grad school in a way that might make it easier on us, and also

more fun.”– Attack your Day (Before it Attacks You) by Mark Woods

• Not time management, but activity management“When we choose instant-reward activities at the expense of value-

added activities, our productivity goes down and very often some self-esteem with it.”

• I knew I wanted to incorporate them into reaching my goals

What does my game look like?

• I have turned my graduate school experience a game• One that makes me feel more accomplished, but one that has elements

increasing my productivity so that that sense of accomplishment is genuine and legitimate

– Define levels– Long and short term goals– Set up a reward system– Color-code

How did I measure this?

• Productivity– Level of actual productivity during a given day– End of day, daily– Count how many items had to move to the next day’s to do list

because either...• Didn’t do the amount of it that I planned and needed to do that day;

or• Didn’t even touch it

• Achievement– Perceived closeness to degree– End of day, daily– Scale of 1-5

What I learned...

• Games are fun• Grad school is easier if you have fun• Making grad school a game has made

graduate school easier for me

The end