• Faculty

  • Colleen Macklin

    Professor of Media Design

    Email
    colleen@newschool.edu

    Office Location
    Parsons Faculty Hotseat

    Download vCard

    Colleen Macklin

    Profile

    Colleen Macklin is a game designer and a Professor in the school of Art, Media and Technology at Parsons School of Design. She’s interested in how games model and reveal ideologies through systems. At Parsons, she is the founder and co-director of PETLab, a design research lab that develops games for experimental learning and social engagement. PETLab projects include disaster preparedness games and sports with the Red Cross, the urban activist game Re:Activism and the physical/fiscal sport Budgetball. She is a member of the game design collective Local No. 12, known for the videogame Dear Reader and the social card game, The Metagame. She has co-authored (with John Sharp), Games, Design and Play: A detailed look at iterative game design (Addison Wesley Professional, 2016) and Iterate: Ten Lessons in Design and Failure (MIT Press, 2019). Colleen has a BFA in Media Arts from Pratt Institute, and an MA in International Affairs from The New School.

    Research Interests

    dynamic systems, ethical AI, play and perception, game design

    Awards And Honors

    Fellow, MIT Media Lab

    Lifetime Achievement, Horizons Faculty of Excellence Award, Higher Education Video Game Alliance (HEVGA) & IndieCade

    Inaugural Fellow, Higher Education Videogame Alliance (HEVGA)

    Dear Reader, “Meaningful Play Award” International Mobile Gaming Awards, Marseilles, France   Dear Reader, Games for Change, Best Gameplay Award finalist, New York, NY   Dear Reader, Ludicious Game Festival, special selection, Zurich, Switzerland

    Portfolio

    www.colleenmacklin.com

    Future Courses

    Core Studio Systems
    PUDT 3100, Fall 2026

    Game Design as Play Design
    PGTE 5500, Fall 2026

  • Take The Next Step

Submit your application

Undergraduates

To apply to any of our undergraduate programs (except the Bachelor's Program for Adults and Transfer Students and Parsons Associate of Applied Science programs) complete and submit the Common App online.

Undergraduate Adult Learners

To apply to any of our Bachelor's Program for Adults and Transfer Students and Parsons Associate of Applied Science programs, complete and submit the New School Online Application.

Graduates

To apply to any of our Master's, Doctoral, Professional Studies Diploma, and Graduate Certificate programs, complete and submit the New School Online Application.