Americans with Disabilities Act Scavenger Hunt

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jlse.12072
• Author: Ursula Ramsey
• Date: 01 December 2018
• Published date: 01 December 2018

Journal of Legal Studies Education

Volume 35, Issue 1, 143–164, Winter 2018

Americans with Disabilities Act

Scavenger Hunt

Ursula Ramsey∗

I. INTRODUCTION

Whether it is the thrill of the search or the excitement of discovery, a well-

organized scavenger hunt can strike just the right competitive chord. For

instance, beginning in 2016, players of the game Pok´

emon GOTM,acousin

to a scavenger hunt, went on searches for Pok´

emonTM at physical locations as

diverse as London’s Tower Bridge and the Great Smoky Mountains National

Park.1In 2011 and again in 2012, nearly 15,000 participants from ninety

countries organized sing-a-longs, pranks, and random acts of kindness to

break the Guinness World RecordTM for the largest media scavenger hunt.2

And, in every year since 1987, University of Chicago students have searched

∗Assistant Professor of Business Law Limestone College.

This exercise was a finalist in the 2017 Charles M. Hewitt Master Teacher competition at the

Annual Meeting of the Academy of Legal Studies in Business in Savannah, Georgia.

1Thomas Tamblyn, Pokemon GO Tips: 10 Famous Locations Where You Can Catch Rare Pokemon,

HUFFINGTON POST (July 27, 2016), http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/pokemon-go-tips-

10-famous-locations-where-you-can-catch-rare-pokemon_uk_57988103e4b06d7c426e0771; Dave

Thier, What Is ‘Pokémon GO,’ and Why Is Everybody Talking About it?,F

ORBES (July

11, 2016), https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidthier/2016/07/11/facebook-twitter-social-what-

is-pokemon-go-and-why-is-everybody-talking-about-it/#6cb6803a1758; Travel Channel, Famous

Places That Are Pokemon GO PokeStops, http://www.travelchannel.com/roam-blog/news-

deals/famous-places-that-are-pokemon-go-pokestops.

2David Pogue, Inside the World’s Greatest Scavenger Hunt, Part 1, YAHOO! FINANCE (Apr.

14, 2017), https://finance.yahoo.com/news/inside-worlds-greatest-scavenger-hunt-part-1-

184128389.html (noting that 55,000 people registered for GISHWHES 2016’s scavenger hunt);

GISHWHES, Past Years’ GISHWHES Item Wish List Examples, https://www.gishwhes.

com/submission_examples.php/ (last visited June 15, 2017); Guinness World Records, Misha

Collins and GISHWHES: The World’s Largest Media Scavenger Hunt!, http://www.

guinnessworldrecords.com/news/2013/3/misha-collins-and-the-worlds-largest-scavenger-hunt-

47380/ (last visited June 11, 2017).

C2018 The Author

Journal of Legal Studies Education C2018 Academy of Legal Studies in Business

143

144 Vol. 35 / The Journal of Legal Studies Education

the city and beyond, some going so far as constructing nuclear reactors, to

win the school’s four-day scavenger hunt competition.3

As research supports the pedagogical value of educational games, such

as scavenger hunts, then the fun inherent in a scavenger hunt can be har-

nessed as a learning tool. The value of a scavenger hunt as a learning tool

becomes more apparent in considering the learning profile of the undergrad-

uate Business Law student. When considering current Business Law students

at a broad, generational level, researchers have found that these millennial

students tend to share certain characteristics that shape how they learn: mil-

lennials exhibit technological advancement, an ability to multitask, extremely

social behavior, an appreciation for structure and rules, a strong orientation

toward teamwork, a tendency to become easily bored, and an expectation for

instant gratification.4These components of the millennials’ learning profile

mesh nicely with a pedagogical scavenger hunt.5

This article describes a scavenger hunt for Business Law students. Specif-

ically, students compete in this scavenger hunt to identify accessible design

features on campus to undergird their study of Title III of the Americans

with Disabilities Act (ADA). Title III of the ADA prohibits public accommo-

dations from discriminating on the basis of disability and requires that the

design, construction, and alteration of public accommodations comply with

the ADA’s accessibility standards.6The scavenger hunt is part of a lesson that

targets four learning objectives: (1) students will demonstrate their knowl-

edge of Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act by participating in a

3Rob Wile, This Year’sUniversity of Chicago Scavenger Hunt Show [sic] Why American Universities Rule

the World,B

US.INSIDER (May 11, 2014), http://www.businessinsider.com/university-of-chicago-

2014-scavenger-hunt-2014-5; UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO,THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO SCAVENGER

HUNT, http://scavhunt.uchicago.edu/lore.html (last visited June 15, 2017).

4Jean M. Twenge, Generational Changes and Their Impact in the Classroom: Teaching Generation Me,

43 MED.EDUC. 398, 403 (2009); Karen Worley, Educating College Students of the Net Generation,22

ADULT LEARNING 31, 32 (2011). Although this activity could be modified for an online course,

it is designed as an activity for a traditional day class. Thus, the focus of the student profile is

on students who transition directly from high school to college; however, the author does ac-

knowledge that all day students may not be classified appropriately as millennials. Furthermore,

the author acknowledges that all students within the millennial generation do not necessarily

exhibit all of these traits.

5See generally WILLIAM STRAUSS &NEIL HOWE,GENERATIONS:THE HISTORY OF AMERICA’SFUTURE,

1584 TO 2069 59 (1991). In this book, the seminal work on the subject, the authors do note

that “[l]ike most other social categories—religion, political party, income, occupation, race—

generations can be imprecise at the boundaries.”

628 C.F.R. § 36.101 (2017).