Elisabeth R. Gee (formerly Hayes) is the Delbert & Jewell Lewis chair in reading & literacy, professor in MLFTC and affiliate faculty in the department of English. She was a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1990-2007) where she chaired the English education program (2001-2006), and the graduate program in Continuing and Adult Education (2000-2003) prior to joining the ASU faculty. Gee was on the faculty at Syracuse University (1987-1990) and Rutgers University (1986-87), where she earned her doctorate. She was a founding member of the Games, Learning & Society research collective at UW-Madison. Gee is the current co-director of the Play2Connect project, focusing on intergenerational game play as a means of promoting learning and positive family relationships. Her recent research includes a study of Mexican-American families' use of digital media for learning and an investigation of game design as a means of promoting design thinking among children and families. Gee was named a 2011 White House Champion of Change for her work on using games and digital media to engage girls in computing. She has authored and edited numerous publications, most recently including Play2Connect (to appear in 2017, co-authored with Sinem Siyahhan), Re-Imagining Multiliteracies (to appear in 2017, co-edited with Frank Serafini), Learning in Video Game Affinity Spaces (2012, co-edited with Sean Duncan), and Language and Learning in the Digital Age (2011, co-authored with James Gee). Her work has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, and the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Gee is co-PI on the NSF-funded "Play in the Making" project, that aims to develop an empirically-based teaching and learning model for broadening participation of girls, minority, and low-income middle school students in STEM and Making in schools and libraries. Her team is collaborating with middle school teachers and librarians to create and test a series of design challenges that engage middle school students in addressing personally and socially significant real-world problems through game making in Maker spaces. The research objectives of this project include developing a better understanding of the development of design thinking through game design and how mentors can play a role in promoting Making and design thinking.