How can we make gender perspectives tangible in higher education and adult learning?
How can complex institutional challenges become a shared, reflective experience?
Within the Erasmus+ project GEDIS – Gender Diversity in Information Science: Challenges in Higher Education, we have developed an innovative open educational resource designed precisely for this purpose.
- The Hive – Serious Card Game (Print & Play Edition)
- What Makes The Hive Different?
- Who Is It For?
- From Gameplay to Critical Reflection
- Open Educational Resource
The Hive – Serious Card Game (Print & Play Edition)
“The Hive” is a cooperative card game for 2–4 players (with an additional solo mode) that transforms gender inclusion into an engaging and strategic learning experience. Rather than discussing equality only at a theoretical level, participants must actively build an inclusive “hive” by allocating limited human resources to pedagogical, organisational and community-oriented tasks.
The metaphor is simple yet powerful:
Just like a hive, an academic institution thrives when diversity, collaboration and balanced teamwork are consciously designed.
What Makes The Hive Different?
The game is structured around two main types of cards:
- Task Cards – representing inclusive teaching practices, support services, curriculum redesign, outreach initiatives and institutional development actions.
- Team Cards – representing diverse human profiles that must be strategically combined to ensure balance and equity.
Success depends not only on completing tasks, but on creating diverse and gender-balanced teams, reflecting the real challenges of inclusive academic design.
The resource includes:
- Printable card decks
- Set-up instructions
- Turn sequence guidelines
- Scoring system
- Solo-play variant
- Visual examples of correct and incorrect card placement
- Facilitator recommendations for debriefing
This makes the game immediately usable even for trainers without previous experience in game-based learning.
Who Is It For?
“The Hive” is particularly suitable for:
- Teaching staff
- Librarians
- Equality officers
- Academic developers
- Interdisciplinary project teams
- Master’s and doctoral students
- Adult education trainers
It can be integrated into workshops on:
- Gender equality
- Curriculum redesign
- Library and Information Science
- Project management
- Teacher training
- Institutional development
Because it is print-and-play, it is low-cost, easily adaptable to different languages, and reusable across multiple training contexts. It can also be adapted for online sessions using breakout rooms.
From Gameplay to Critical Reflection
The real pedagogical value of “The Hive” lies in the debriefing phase. The facilitator guide offers practical strategies to:
- Connect in-game challenges with real institutional barriers
- Encourage dialogue about invisible workload and gender bias
- Reflect on resource allocation and structural inequalities
- Stimulate collective responsibility for inclusive design
By turning abstract policy principles into a cooperative challenge, the game promotes empathy, negotiation skills and shared problem-solving.
Open Educational Resource
“The Hive – Serious Card Game” is fully aligned with the GEDIS commitment to open education. It is designed as a reusable and adaptable OER for higher and adult education contexts.
Through this initiative, GEDIS continues to explore innovative methodologies that combine:
- Gender-sensitive pedagogy
- Game-based learning
- Institutional reflection
- European cooperation
Join Us: Subscribe to Our Newsletter
If you would like to stay informed about our initiatives, receive exclusive content, and become part of this growing community, subscribe to our newsletter. Click here to subscribe: https://gediseuproject.substack.com/