Freedom Summer App Gets Re-Vamped As Senior Capstone Project

BY DARICE CHAPEL
Miami University journalism student

Two years after Miami University celebrated the 50th anniversary of 1964's Freedom Summer, members of the Miami community are still working to keep the legacy alive.

The Freedom Summer App

Ann Elizabeth Armstrong, an associate professor of theater, has spent the last two years bringing to life a mobile application that will allow users to complete an interactive walking tour through what used to be the Western College for Women.

Armstrong was awarded a grant of $59,994 from the National Endowment for the Humanities in 2014 to develop the app, one that grew from her 2004 "Walk With Me" Freedom Summer Walking Tour.

Armstrong's work pays tribute to the Freedom Summer events that took place in Oxford in 1964. That summer, 800 volunteers trained at the Western College as civil rights activists before being sent to Mississippi to help register black voters, and run Freedom Schools and community centers. Oxford's role in Freedom Summer was cemented forever when three of those volunteers -- Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman -- died at the hands of the Ku Klux Klan just a day after leaving Ohio and arriving in Mississippi.

This semester, Armstrong took the next step in expanding her work, with the help of four Miami computer science engineering students: Jackson Coulter, Daltin Loomis, John Crabill and Evan Baker. The students, all seniors, have been meeting weekly to work on the mobile app.

According to Baker, he and Loomis have been roommates since they were sophomores. He knew Crabill and Coulter from other computer science classes. Their work is serving as their senior capstone project. They each dedicate two to four hours a week to it, Baker estimated.

"The Freedom Summer app is a game inside of an app called ARIS. ARIS is an app that allows you to make geo-location games where a user has to physically move to a location to trigger the next event in the game," Baker said.

In ARIS -- which stands for Augmented Reality Interactive Storytelling -- a user must complete one part of the Freedom Summer walking tour to move on to the next.

How is the work load handled?

With the project being a long-term commitment, the group agreed to split the work evenly. "We work on the app together so that we can keep up with what we have learned and done with it," Crabill said. "It was decided fairly early on that this was the best way for us as a group."

According to Coulter, the group was assigned the Freedom Summer app as their senior project by the chair of the Computer Science and Software Engineering Department, James Kiper. "We basically try and break down a problem and dole those out to different members of our team," Coulter said.

Miami senior Rhonda Baldwin hopes the app will gain popularity. In the second semester of her freshman year, Baldwin participated in the Undergraduate Research Option Program, and spent her time working with University Archivist Jacqueline Johnson researching Freedom Summer. She says that when she first started her research project, her job "was to interview people that were students on campus at the time of the Mississippi Freedom Summer, and to transcribe all documents of interviews."

In regard to the popularity of the app, Baldwin says "I do think that the app has the potential to be bigger than what it is. Now that I am aware of the app, I do think it's essential in preserving history here at Miami University."

How can the app benefit users?

With Western College for Women closed since 1974 and the space used to create Miami's Western Program, Miami began exploring the Freedom Summer story soon after. In 2000, it commemorated Freedom Summer events by dedicating an outdoor amphitheater style space on Western campus. In 2014, it hosted a large conference to mark Freedom Summer's 50th anniversary.

"I think the app will benefit users that are interested in the history of Miami and want to get into the school spirit as it were," Crabill said.

"It also creates interaction with outsiders that might not know that this happened so long ago," he said, noting that he himself didn't know about Freedom Summer prior to the project.

Baker said the app will allow users to really relate to the Freedom Summer experience. "The app is just a more engaging and fun way to learn about the Freedom Summer. Rather than just reading a textbook, people can walk around the Western campus and actually be where it took place and get to pretend that they are a part of the Freedom Summer."

Coulter says he thinks the best thing about the app is that "it makes the history feel more real. Even if only superficially, the app puts the player in the shoes of someone who aided in the Freedom Movement, asking them to make choices and reflect upon them."

How do users get the app?

To participate in the walking tour game, users need an iPhone or iPad. The free app -- titled "ARIS" -- is available in the iTunes App Store.

It can only be played on Western Campus.

Photos: Miami dedicated an outdoor amphitheater commemorating Freedom Summer in 2000. -- Photo by Patricia Gallagher Newberry