Chasing Change: How Interactive Play is Powering Climate Action NYC
When saving the planet feels heavy, Holes in the Wall Collective found a lighter way to lift New Yorkers’ spirits and their climate awareness.
Who knew saving the planet could start with a Mission? For artist-activists Julia Rose Meeks and Dhira Rauch, Co-Directors and Founders of Holes in the Wall Collective, tackling New York City’s biggest environmental issues meant first tackling a bigger question: How do you get people to care, joyfully?
They wanted to engage everyday New Yorkers in interactive climate engagement: a mix of curiosity, creativity, and play that made climate action in NYC feel exciting. Goosechase became the tool that helped them bring their long-standing philosophy of joyful, creative engagement to life on a larger stage.
When Climate Week Needed More Interactive Climate Engagement
Every fall, Climate Week NYC gathers thousands of experts, nonprofits, and organizations working toward environmental change. But Julia and Dhira noticed a gap: the same faces, the same echo chambers, and a whole city full of people left out of the conversation.
“We wanted to engage New Yorkers in climate work in a way that felt fun and inviting, not just for experts, but for everyone.” - Julia Rose Meeks
Their early experiments relied on paper passports and neighborhood stamps, creative but impossible to scale. When torrential rain washed out one of their big events, they knew it was time for a new approach.
They didn’t need another brochure or panel. They needed something that could get people moving, build connection between boroughs, and make learning feel like an adventure.
Discovering a Game-Based Way to Spark Climate Action in NYC
In her hunt for a tool to be able to hold their scavenger hunt on a bigger stage, Dhira stumbled across Goosechase.
By the time of Climate Week 2025, the Collective was already in their second year using Goosechase, and they were experimenting using it to connect a wider, and more dispersed community across the city.
During one session at Counter Culture Coffee’s training lab though, they brought Goosechase back to its roots: a dedicated group, all in the same room, engaging live and in person. That event showed just how seamless the app can be when used in a shared physical space, and how different the challenge is when trying to engage participants across the whole city.
“We’ve been learning how to crack the code of getting people to engage with Goosechase when they don’t already know it,” says Dhira. “It’s been a huge learning process, and this in-person experience helped us see how well it works in that context.”
It reinforced what they already knew: that joy and creativity drive participation. What Goosechase offered was a way to scale that energy.
Learning by Playing: Community Storytelling That Brought Climate Action to Life
The Collective’s digital Experiences were ambitious: five events across Climate Week, each testing new formats. Some thrived in tight, high-energy spaces, while others unfolded as sprawling city adventures. Through trial, laughter, and plenty of notebook sketches, the team discovered the magic balance between game mechanics and meaningful engagement.
One standout Mission asked players to write a love letter to the Department of Environmental Protection, “literally the people handling our wastewater,” says Dhira. The results were unexpectedly heartfelt, funny, and creative, reminding everyone how personal sustainability can be.
Another Mission invited participants to share short videos from their favorite waterways across New York. The Goosechase feed soon filled with glimpses of hidden creeks, beaches, and rivers, each one narrated by a proud New Yorker sharing why that place mattered.
The Results: Interactive Climate Engagement That Connected Every Borough
Goosechase helped us create a link between communities across the five boroughs. Participants ventured into neighborhoods they’d never visited, met new people, and found creative ways to celebrate local action. For Dhira and Julia, those small wins became the real rewards and further proof that playful, sustainable event ideas can bring people together one Mission at a time. “Both of the winners told us they went places they’d never been. They just needed that little nudge to explore,” says Dhira.
Beyond the games themselves, the partnership has been a creative dialogue. The Collective has shared ideas and feedback on how features like the activity feed could help users connect more deeply, and they have acted as a sounding board for how the platform can evolve to better serve community-based Experiences.
Looking Ahead: Building Sustainable Event Ideas for Future Play
After two years of experimenting with Goosechase, Dhira and Julia are still “cracking the code,” and having a blast doing it. They’re dreaming up new ways to blend live art, music, and storytelling into game-based learning Experiences that spark purpose. Their Goosechase Experiences now fuel community storytelling, inspire local volunteering, and remind New Yorkers that climate action doesn’t have to be grim. It can be full of delight.
“We’re really interested to see how Goosechase as a tool could keep growing with us and how play can keep inspiring real connection and impact.” - Dhira Rauch
Because in a city that never stops moving, it turns out a scavenger hunt might be the perfect invitation to pause, play, and connect, and a new way to power climate action in NYC.
What is Goosechase?
At Goosechase, experience is everything. Originally inspired by scavenger hunts, Goosechase is an online platform that enables organizations and schools to engage, activate, and educate their communities through delightful interactive experiences. Sign up and try creating a free recreational Experience, or check out our Pricing!
