From Gardens to Game Levels: An Endless Summer of World-Building
This summer, a garden in Manhattan became a video game, students in the Bronx built entire worlds from scratch, and hundreds more joined in from across the country! Beyond Urban Arts’ usual Game Academy programs, our middle and high schools students plugged into game design through two Summer Rising residencies, two Bronx workshops, and our national StoryQuest Camp, using open-source tools from Endless Studios’ Threadbare.
Summer Rising is New York City’s free summer program for public school students, combining academic support with hands-on enrichment. At MS297 in Manhattan, Urban Arts teacher Caroline Turret guided roughly 100 rising 6th-8th graders through a summer exploring St. Luke’s, a nearby public garden. Through Threadbare: Explore, each class built its own platformer level in Godot themed around the garden, dodging cars, flies, and bees through city streets. At 08X371, a Summer Rising site in the Bronx, Urban Arts teacher Dario Bolivar led 65 sixth graders through the full game-making process: brainstorming, art, animation, music, storytelling, and marketing.
Testimonial Video by Dario: Watch here
We also ran two workshops with Fordham University’s Liberty Partnerships Program (LPP), supporting 40 Bronx middle and high schoolers on the path to college. Taught by Caroline alongside Urban Arts alum Paola Soto, students built character animations for a 2D platformer, including one who created a full set of assets for a squirrel collecting acorns. A parent wrote that their son “couldn’t stop talking about today” as the experience broadened students’ sense of future paths in STEM.
Rounding out the summer, StoryQuest Camp — an online game design “sprint” with students joining virtually from across the country — brought together 119 students across four cohorts, taught by Urban Arts alumni MG Irvine and Richard Nguyen. Students built ambitious final levels in Explore: Godot, from dash mechanics and gravity flips to grapple hooks and full boss fights. As MG put it, “it was really cool seeing who was interested in narrative, or art, or coding, and seeing how they all tackled different problems in their own way.”
Built with Endless, brought to life by our students.
Access That Changes Everything: Inside Urban Arts’ 3rd Annual College Forum
For students from low-income communities, the biggest barrier to college often isn’t ambition, it’s access. Last Friday, Urban Arts hosted its 3rd Annual College Forum at PwC in midtown, free through our College Access Program, ensuring our students enjoy direct access to both higher education leaders and college representatives.
Director of Post-Secondary Success Joelle Blackstock hosted and organized an hour-long panel featuring two industry leaders committed to expanding pathways for all students, with Urban Arts alum and ambassador Faiza Mohammed serving as moderator:
Dr. Charles J. Gibbs, Ed.D., President of Metropolitan College of New York
Sabrina Avila, Senior Manager of the STEM Research Academy at CUNY K16 Initiatives & Adult Pathways
Students and parents called the conversation “inspiring,” “encouraging,” “motivating,” and “very interesting.”
College Fellows: Inaugural Year for a Game-changing Program
Urban Arts teaches video game design as a pathway to college and career. Plus, we offer a free College Access program, boosting futures in STEM and the arts. Our pilot College Fellows program hired five alumni as advisors, providing paid positions with pre-professional training, a schedule that works for them, and a resume building block.
For young people, the most authentic guides are those who have just walked the walk, which is why we invest in our alumni with paid, purpose-driven opportunities to support the next generation. Through the College Fellows program, current college students bring their real-world experience, empathy, and hard-earned knowledge back to current high school seniors, offering weekly near-peer mentorship across applications, essays, financial aid, and everything in between. It works. 100% of Urban Arts seniors are accepted to college and they’ve earned $71M in scholarships since 2020.
Within the 31 students served in the Fellows program, they earned $8.4M in aid.
Urban Arts Opens Google-Powered Studio, Designed by Award-Winning Producer IMAKEMADBEATS
We’re proud to announce the opening of our state-of-the-art sound studio at the Urban Arts Game Academy—powered by Google and built by Memphis-based artist/producer and UNAPOLOGETIC. Founder and CEO IMAKEMADBEATS. Our students helped build the space themselves—hands-on, with power tools and high-tech installations, making it a true reflection of our mission: creativity in action.
10-Minutes of Real Talk about Women in STEAM
Here’s a really special moment that deserves a listen. Agatha Hood, VP, Customer Success & Operations at @Unity Technologies, sat down with Urban Arts alum and current NYU student Faiza Mohamed for a forthright conversation about working in the games and tech industry.
Agatha has over two decades of experience in games, and almost ten years at #UnityTechnologies. She’s worked with major developers and brands, held different roles from ops to creative production, and worked on everything from downloadable PC games through VR. Currently, Agatha runs the Customer Success & Ops team at Unity helping customers successfully adopt and use Unity’s products, as well as optimizing internal productivity through data, #AI, and software.