Governance and Global Affairs
Serious Games
The Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs of Leiden University in The Hague has developed a Serious Game, 'het Grote Migratiespel' to introduce secondary school students to their study and research programmes.
In a fun and easy way secondary school students are introduced to the complexity of societal problems that are taught and researched at the Faculty. The Serious Games provide insight into the actors involved with societal problems and the, at times difficult, interactions between and within these actors. The students are presented with different interests, are asked to make decisions based on these interests and have to face the consequences of such decisions for and in the role of one of the actors.
The Serious Game can be played while visiting the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs. During their visit, secondary school students attend a lecture on the subject of one of the games and afterwards play the serious game led by students of the Faculty. The Serious Games are played in Dutch.
Het Grote Migratiespel
In Het Grote Migratiespel (the Big Migration Game), students are challenged to take on the role of one of the actors involved with a wave of refugees travelling from Syria to Europe. The students have to make decisions concerning the migrants with the ultimate aim to determine how many migrants eventualy will reach Europe. The game can be played in one up to two hours.
Het Grote Migratiespel has been developed to represent some of the cases studied by the bachelor Public Administration that is taught at the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs. By playing the game, students become familiar with the complexity of societal problems such as the refugee crisis.
How to play the game
A class with students is divided into five groups and are given the role of one of the following actors: the European Union, the Government of Turkey, the Government of The Netherlands, the Smugglers, and a family of refugees traveling to Europe. The actors are confronted with a group of 200 Syrians that are about to start on their journey to 'heaven on earth': Europe. In four rounds, the five actors have to make decisions that will have an influence on group of refugees. The actors are presented with different choices concerning the migrants in Turkey, in the Mediterranean and eventually on the border with the European Union.
In every round, the students are given three ‘action cards’ with different options. In collaboration with their group members, the students need to make an informed choice for one of the three options. Once each group has made their choice, the chosen actions and consequences of these actions are discussed in class. Every chosen action influences the number of migrants travelling: the number can go up or down. After every round, the supervisor reports the results: how many migrants are travelling to Europe?
The game revolves around the number of migrants that reach Europe. The number of refugees depends on the choices made by the different actors. Whether this final number is ‘wrong’ or ‘right’ is also a matter for discussion among the students.
Visit the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs
Secondary school students are introduced to the Faculty of Governance and Global Affairs and its education and research programmes during their visit to the Faculty. Secondary schools are able to play a Serious Game at the Faculty in The Hague. During the visit, secondary school students are taught more about the subject of the Serious Game by one of our researchers or teachers. After the lecture, the secondary school students play the Serious Game led by one of our students. This way, students learn about the subject of the Serious Game, the Faculty, the bachelors taught at the Faculty, and what it is like to be a student.
Due to high demand and limited availability, visits are only open to groups of senior secondary school students from pre-university education (VWO). A minimum of 25 and a maximum of 75 students per day applies, and as of January 2025, a visit will incur costs.