About the Kukui Cup

The Kukui Cup Project explores novel ways to utilize concepts from information technology, community-based social marketing, serious games, and educational pedagogy to support sustained change in sustainability-related behaviors.

A defining feature of Kukui Cup challenges is a blend of real world and virtual world activities, all tied together through game mechanics.   In the real world, players participate in workshops, geocaching, scavenger hunts, artistic/musical events, win prizes, and most importantly, learn about their current lifestyle and its impact on sustainability behaviors.  In the virtual world of the Kukui Cup web application, players earn points, achieve badges, increase their sustainability “literacy” through readings and videos, and use social networking mechanisms to engage with friends and family about the issues raised. The challenge is designed to make real-world and virtual-world activities complementary and synergistic.

Each Kukui Cup Challenge is typically designed with the following goals for its participants:

  • Increase knowledge about sustainability issues;
  • Gain insight about the impact of one’s current behaviors and how to change them for sustainability;
  • Build community, through awareness of local and national sustainability organizations and initiatives;
  • Create commitment, from minor (turn off the lights when not in use) to major (pursue a profession related to sustainability).

Every Kukui Cup challenge is built upon technology developed by the Collaborative Software Development Laboratory at the University of Hawaii.   Our technology is designed to enable designers to (relatively) easily define and integrate new challenges for energy, water, waste, food, and allow sites to easily customize their instance of the Kukui Cup with the challenges best suited to their situation.

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