Anonymous Like Columtreal Uni, we reserved a lot of prims for a K-12 campus in Fishtown (replacing the Elementary/High that was in BB). Supporting the youth of CD, we're hoping to make it it's own self-sustaining community that shouldn't have to rely on Hathian itself. So, looking at SL as a whole, we're taking the challenge of developing role-play for youths that would primarily stay within Fishtown.
The reason I specifically mention this is because there is a common trend of folks creating kid avatars to do some RP at the sight of a new school ... sort of jumping on the bandwagon because it's the "new" thing (not necessarily a bad at all), but eventually retreat to their usual RP. This is why I emphasize on developing it's own community, meaning, players who probably have never experienced role-play, but would and learn how to do it through our fishtown campus. Thus, these folks would find the campus as their home, just like most of us has found Hathian or CU our home, depending on which OOC area we first landed in.
Our application system has done a good job keeping the quality fairly stable across the Hathian/CU; with a tweaked RP guide for youths, we're hoping we can do the same for Fishtown. There's also an obvious interest as there are plenty of applications coming in for the youth group, and both Rabid/Tre have invested a lot of time in Fishtown to support the RP.
Chance had an interesting idea he posed over the summer; rather than developing "another" school, which are plenty available in SL, we might try an "afterschool center" ... of course, there are classrooms so those can be used for any kind of activity really, including classes. Focused on recreational activities, it should serve as an interesting hang out spot as well.
BeBe has also spent some time devoting land and areas of CD for kids that we will connect through a bus stop system from the school.
With all this said, I'd like to open it up to take some feedback as to what kind of programs/activities we could try. Keep in mind, not everyone will be into troublesome activities; we have to design it so it's inclusive to all types. Once we get some feedback, I design/build the school, as well as work with the community in developing a proper guide and various other setups.
