Best Education Interactive Application

Produced by THIRTEEN Productions LLC for WNET is Association with Bridge Multimedia, Railway Hero is the first accessible and universally designed digital game from the PBS KIDS math series Cyberchase, created specifically to incorporate accessibility features for children with physical and cognitive impairments.

In this math-based HTML5 game, players join the CyberSquad in the Solar CyberTrain on a mission to repair cyberspace’s Information SuperRailway, after pieces of its track were stolen by the villain Hacker. Using math problem-solving strategies including counting, addition and spatial reasoning, players fill in the empty tracks in the railway on an epic journey across cybersites.

Railway Hero was designed using a “born accessible” approach with accessibility functions built into the game design from the ground up. To make the game accessible to as many children as possible, the game incorporated a number of features to support learners with a variety of physical and cognitive needs. They include:

- Customizable screen display options, including text size, color and contrast options
- Audio control options, including adjustable music, sound effects and voiceover levels
- Support for blind or visually impaired users, including audio description and keyboard controls
- Support for deaf or hard of hearing users, including captioning
- A variety of cognitive supports, including in-game learning supports, the ability to change text sizes and colors, caption controls and audio descriptions

Funding for Cyberchase is provided by The JPB Foundation, the Heising-Simons Foundation and Ernst & Young LLP. Additional funding is provided by Lynne and Marc Benioff, the Tiger Baron Foundation, Shailaja and Umesh Nagarkatte and Ellen Marcus. Accessibility for “Railway Hero” is partially funded by the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs, through grants #H327C150007 and H327C150008. However, this content does not necessarily represent the policy of the U.S. Department of Education and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal government. Project
Officer, Jo Ann McCann.

Contributors:

Executive Producer:	Kristin DiQuollo/ THIRTEEN
Executive Producer:	Sandra Sheppard/THIRTEEN
Producer:	Michelle Chen/THIRTEEN
Coordinating Producer:	Ana Voci/THIRTEEN
Math Advisor:	Bob Krech/THIRTEEN
Lead Accessibility Advisor, Visual, Hearing and Cognitive Impairments:	Matt Kaplowitz/Bridge Multimedia
Lead Accessibility Advisor, Visual, Hearing and Cognitive Impairments:	Wendy Sapp/Bridge Multimedia
Accessibility Advisor, STEM:	Steve Noble/Bridge Multimedia
Accessibility Advisor, UX:	John Huth/Bridge Multimedia
Accessibility Advisor, Coding:	David Schleppenbach/Bridge Multimedia

SUDDEN INDUSTRIES

Website: www.suddenindustries.com

Location: USA

About the Agency:

Sudden Industries (Sudden) (www.suddenindustries.com) is an award-winning, privately held digital agency based in New York City. Sudden was founded over 20 years ago by entertainment and media veteran Bob Holmes. Sudden provides strategic, creative, and technology solutions to some of the world’s best kids, family and education brands, including PBS, WNET, Nickelodeon, Pearson, the US Dept. of Education, WTTW, the Committee for Children, DHX, Barnes & Noble, Mad Science, Simon & Schuster, Random House and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Sudden’s solutions have included responsive websites, games, apps, content management systems, ecommerce portals, and kiosks for digital education products such as Nature Cat, Cyberchase, Magic Tree House, Poptropica, Funbrain, Nick Jr. Boost, UMIGO, Galactic Hotdogs, Sparknotes, Mind Yeti, Carmen Sandiego and Adventure Pig. Sudden is known as a market leader based on the quality of its work and has been recognized over 75 times by prestigious awards including: The Webbies, The One Club, The Art Directors Club, The Web Awards, The Communicator Awards, the Daveys, the IAC Awards, and the Mobile Awards.