Friday, July 14, 2023
The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction Library Services Team is joining library and education professionals around the state for the Play Make Learn 2023 Conference. 
Librarians, educators, researchers, developers, and designers whose work involves playful learning, STEAM education, makerspaces, gaming, emergent technologies, and more will be attending this conference and networking opportunity July 20-21 at Memorial Union in Madison, Wisconsin.
Ben Miller, Director of the Library Services Team, will be giving opening remarks starting at 8:40 a.m., July 20, in the Great Hall. In addition, he will moderate the Library Innovation panel presentation July 20 from 10:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. in Langdon (4th Floor) which includes:
- Learning at Hand – a lending library and PD hub to make hands-on learning available to every student, every day.
Presenters: Leah Rosenbaum and Katie Schober, Learning at Hand - Baby Dinosaurs are Wandering the Library
Presenters: Samantha Geiger, Northern Kentucky University - Introducing Elementary Students to Design Thinking
Presenters: Julie Van Esler, Lora Vahlsing, and Chris Durkin, Design Lab
Chris Baker, Library Services Team Public Library Consultant and a Play Make Learn Conference Chair, will present alongside Jeanette Rydberg from the Thomas St. Angelo Public Library of Cumberland and Rebecca Van Dan from the Eager Free Public Library. Their presentation VR, Libraries, Learning, & Outreach: Stories from the Field of the PolarVR Project will take place July 21 from 12:30-1:30 p.m. in National Panhellenic (2nd Floor).
Baker will also emcee the conference including introducing the event's keynote speakers Dr. Kishonna Gray and Dr. Margaret Huettl.
July 20, 2023, Keynote: Kishonna Gray
Kishonna Gray is an Associate Professor of Writing, Rhetoric, & Digital Studies and Africana Studies at the University of Kentucky. She is also a faculty associate at the Berkman-Klein Center at Harvard University. Dr. Gray is the author or co-editor of numerous books and articles including her foundational 2014 work Race, Gender, & Deviance in Xbox Live: Theoretical Perspectives from the Virtual Margins, 2018’s edited collections Woke Gaming and Feminism in Play (from our very own University of Washington press) and most recently Intersectional Tech: Black Users in Digital Gaming. She also has a book currently under contract with NYU Press entitled Black Game Studies. She regularly addresses both academic and industry audiences such as at the Game Developers Conference. She is the winner of numerous awards over the years including The Evelyn Gilbert Unsung Hero Award and the Blacks in Gaming Educator Award.
July 21, 2023, Keynote: Margaret Huettl
Margaret Huettl, a descendant of Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibweg, Assyrian refugees, and European settlers, is the Director of the Indigenous Studies Certificate at UW-Oshkosh. She is a scholar of Native American history and North American Wests, and her research examines the continuities of Ojibwe sovereignty in the context of settler colonialism in both the United States and Canada, centering Ojibwe ways of knowing.
The full Conference Schedule is available online, as well as the Conference Activities page to learn about additional interactive experiences, including: the PML Arcade, a card swap game, poster sessions, Dungeons & Dragons one-shot sessions available both days (perfect for those who’ve never played and want an easy, fun way to learn!), and an unofficial PML After-Party at the I/O Arcade Bar. See you at the conference!