Child’s Play End of Summer 2016 Update

Gamers Give Back Tour
In the last year, we visited 30 children’s hospitals and met around 8,000 kids and caregivers alongside our tour partner, GameChanger. This tour is a way for us deliver hope and happiness to hospitalized kids and their support teams across the country, all thanks to the generosity of you, the gaming community. These visits helped us realize how different each hospital truly is and as a result, we made a change in our giving campaign for 2016. In past years, we had been sending our partner hospitals an identical in-kind gift of consoles, games, accessories and movies. This year, we divided the shipment into two parts: a check designated specifically to the Child Life program and a smaller in-kind gift with a choice of console best suited for the hospital’s needs.

These GGB tour stops have been a great addition to all the good work you help Child’s Play do and we have already started planning for the 2017 GGB Tour.

PAX Booth Pilot

For PAX West 2016, we decided to test out a booth, and it was a great success. We were able to share our mission and give information about Child’s Play to thousands of people and debut some new Child’s Play merchandise. Every time we get the chance to interact with the gaming community in person it reconfirms what great people we have supporting Child’s Play. The booth and the merchandise were a big hit and we look forward to bringing them back for PAX South.

Hospital Partners

This year, Child’s Play added over 15 new partner hospitals and we are looking to add more. If you would like to recommend a children’s hospital in your area, please encourage them to apply. Our goal is to find partner facilities in Mississippi, Rhode Island, New Hampshire and North Dakota so that Child’s Play has least one partner in each of the 50 US states.

Grant Program

A Child’s Play project that many people don’t know about is our grant program. Over the years, we have purchased games and systems for libraries, shelters, schools, trauma centers, transitional housing, day programs and more. We have also helped bring VR setups to hospitals for therapy and distraction as well as iPads to special education classrooms and inpatient psychiatric units. For more information on our grant program, please email [email protected].

Save the Date

This year’s Child’s Play Dinner Auction will be held on Thursday, December 8th, 2016 at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue, WA. The Child’s Play Dinner is an annual black tie extravaganza and we welcome your donations of game collectibles, nerdy art, and even non-geeky delights. If you would like to donate an item, please fill out this simple form. The item form is due by November 30th. Items can be mailed to:

Child’s Play
C/O Dinner Auction
8040 161st Ave NE PMB #418
Redmond, WA 98052

If you have any questions about auction item submission, please feel free to contact Erick Blandin: [email protected]. If you have other questions about the auction, contact Travis Eriksen: [email protected].