Community Planit is a community planning platform that uses gamification to diversify and engage citizens that participate in community decision-making. Designed by Engagement Lab at Emerson College in September 2012,[1] Community Planit is centered around time-sensitive games that help players use their voice in community decisions, as well as community leaders and local officeholders cheaply and easily gain feedback from difficult to reach stakeholders.[2]
Incentives come in the form of coins which have several purposes:
"Coins function to rank players’ performance in the game, and also serve as a currency that can be spent on "causes" which are local projects that benefit the communities playing, such as college application assistance for low-income youth or funding a neighborhood bike program. Players with more coins accumulated have a greater impact on which causes win.[3] "
Each game culminates in real life community planning meeting that acts as a "Game Finale."
Games created on Community Planit's platform have ranged from the neighborhood level to the international level.[4]
Neighborhood level projects include What's "The Point"?, a Salem-based game that involved citizens in a local visioning process.
In April 2013, their game tackling Moldovan unemployment Youth@Work gained the attention of the UK news site, The Guardian.[5]
In March, 2016, Community Planit featured a game about tackling Boston's carbon emissions and sustainability issues.[6]
Community Planit is supported by the Engagement Lab at Emerson College, as well as financial contributions from the Knight Foundation.
Other sponsors include the World Wildlife Fund.[7]