MarioKart Tournament: All Welcome

The peak of this past week’s activities was arguably the MarioKart tournament organized by a 13 year old student. Sometimes adults will react to something like this by saying that video games “have no place at school,” but we think that’s missing some very valuable considerations.  

Yes, video games are usually played at home rather than at school, but they’re not only fun, they’re social and involve both the skills to play the game and “durable skills” like frustration tolerance and other-awareness. 

This also wasn’t just playing a video game together, it was a proper tournament. The organizer and quite a number of interested students met a couple of times beforehand to discuss the logistics, prizes, and player brackets. They weren’t asked by staff to make sure everyone felt included, they just did that - we’re a community. 

All ages and skill abilities were welcomed and encouraged to sign up to play - and it seemed like most students and staff did! Everyone who had a compatible controller at home brought and shared their resources. The organizers rearranged the furniture in the Community Room, set up the projector, and let everyone know the order they would be playing in. 

It was loud, exciting, community-building, student proposed, planned, organized, and managed fun. 

Yes, a video game tournament was played at school. And I think it’s fair to say it checked important boxes as being both delightful and valuable. It’s not just that most young people don’t get to play video games at school, it’s really that most young people don’t get the opportunity to organize events around their interests at school. We hope that changes sometime soon. In the meantime, we’ll continue to be a safe space for fun organized by youth - and we’ll be cheering them on.