One of the greatest challenges in disaster resilience is bridging the gap between science and applicable knowledge for vulnerable communities. Around the world, people live more frequently in areas prone to multiple hazards due to environmental degradation, informal urban development, and socio-economic inequality. Hazards disproportionately impact low-income households in the Global South, who often design and construct their houses without the assistance of trained construction professionals, and who may lack access to preparedness education and expertise making them vulnerable when a hazard strikes. However, even in Europe there is a need to develop greater household preparedness (e.g. noodpakketten) and resilience to crises, as cascading risks and the impacts of multi-hazards are on the rise.
Today, innovative, interactive, and inclusive approaches for educating around preparedness measures for households are few, and are often siloed within the programmes of specific research, humanitarian, or government organizations. This project aims to consolidate and expand on these approaches by developing a winter school, with a specific focus on serious gaming for household disaster resilience.
Gaming approaches have been proven to enable disaster management professionals and people living in hazard-prone areas in a playful and simple way to make crucial choices that protect lives and livelihoods. These approaches help to facilitate thinking around potential dilemmas (e.g. related to interpersonal barriers, social and cultural dynamics, governance issues), which both practitioners and households might face in their preparedness and response capacities.
This winter school will challenge participants to evaluate, use, and develop serious gaming to support the co-creation of household resilience measures. Participants will be encouraged to draw inspiration from existing games, which can offer useful resources and guidance in game design methodologies. Ultimately The school will provide unique learning and networking opportunities for researchers, government and humanitarian practitioners, and civil society members.