Elizabeth Lane Lawley, ph.d.

professor of interactive games & media · rochester institute of technology · elizabeth.lawley@rit.edu

I’m a professor in the School of Interactive Games & Media at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), and a faculty affiliate at the RIT MAGIC Center. My current research interests include the intersection of games and tourism, the evaluation and dissemination of creative scholarly work, and the use of generative AI tools in higher education. I teach game design, web design, and production classes.


Teaching

Fall 2023

Introduction to Interactive Media

IGME-110

This class is a "big picture" overview of the study of interactive media, ranging from social and legal aspects of media through the underlying technical aspects of various media types. Topics include research, analysis, and communication skills using a variety of media, including text, images, audio, video and presentation software.

Introduction to Game Web Technology

IGME-235

An introduction to HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for game design & development majors. Covers implementation of static web pages, with an emphasis on standards-compliant, well-structured web pages using up-to-date web technologies.

Spring 2024

Experience Design for Games & Media

IGME-236

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Special Topics Seminar: Introduction to Generative AI

IGME-590/790

An overview of current generative AI tools and technologies, with a focus on applicaitons in games and interactive media.


Research

My current research interests include the intersection of games and tourism, the evaluation and dissemination of creative scholarly work, and the use of generative AI tools in higher education.

I was named a Fulbright Teaching Scholar in 2014, and spent the spring semester in Dubrovnik, Croatia developing and teaching courses on games and tourism for Croatian and US study abroad students. In the spring of 2018, I ran the first study abroad program on the intersection of the two fields with students from RIT.

As a games and media scholar with a background in library and information science, I am particularly interested in the publishing challenges facing scholars in interdisciplinary digital media fields—including both games and digital humanities. I am currently working on projects related to overlay journals for highlighting interdisciplinary research published in discipline-specific journals, and the development of a repository system to provide access and authoritative citations to digital media projects.

Project Highlights

I was the lead PI and producer for two large community-focused games, Just Press Play at RIT, and Picture the Impossible in Rochester, NY.

Just Press Play

2011-2013

Just Press Play was an achievement system developed for students in RIT’s School of Interactive Games, designed to engage students, faculty, and staff in a playful way with their educational environments and experiences.

  • Decker, A., & Lawley, E. L. (2013). Life‘s a Game and the Game of Life: How Making a Game out of It Can Change Student Behavior. Proceeding of the 44th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education, 233–238. https://doi.org/10.1145/2445196.2445269
  • Lawley, E. L., & Phelps, A. (2013). “You Know Youre Going to Fail, Right?”: Learning From Design Flaws in Just Press Play at RIT. Presented at GLS 9.0 Conference, Madison, WI.
  • Martinez, R., Martin, C., Harris, S., Squire, K., Phelps, A., & Lawley, E. (2012). Just Press Play: Design Implications for Gamifying the Undergraduate Experience. Proceedings of GLS 8.0. Madison, WI: ETC Press.
  • Rheingold, H. (2012). Elizabeth Lawley: “Just Press Play” — Adding a Game Layer to the Undergraduate Experience | DMLcentral. Retrieved from http://dmlcentral.net/blog/howard-rheingold/elizabeth-lawley-%E2%80%9Cjust-press-play%E2%80%9D-%E2%80%94-adding-game-layer-undergraduate

Picture the Impossible

2008-2009

Picture the Impossible was a community-based game developed jointly by the Lab for Social Computing at the Rochester Institute of Technology, and the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle. It was intended to encourage more residents of the metropolitan area to explore and learn about Rochester's rich cultural heritage, and to encourage both creativity and charitable giving in the community. The game incorporated a range of activities, including casual web-based games, games that brought players out to events and locations throughout the community, and games that involved the tangible aspects of the Democrat & Chronicle newspaper itself


Contacting Me

elizabeth.lawley@rit.edu • 1.585.598.4947

2545 Golisano Hall • 152 Lomb Memorial Drive • Rochester, NY 14623