Game On

Up a flight of stairs in a building in downtown Belfast, a group of teenagers are debating the merits of throwing a fireball at a dragon. In another room, children are pitting fantastically colored creatures against each other. They’re among the role-playing game enthusiasts who make the Game Loft, a nonprofit youth center, their home-away-from-home.

Games are more than just games here, says Game Loft co-executive director Patricia Estabrook. While the games are fun, Estabrook says their primary purpose is to teach analytical, social, and teambuilding skills the kids will use throughout life. In fact, she jokes, if there were any truth in advertising, the Game Loft would be renamed the Personal Life Transformation Center for Kids and Young Adults.

“But who would want to come to a youth center named that?” she asks.

Numerous accolades can attest to the Game Loft’s worth in Belfast. In 2000, Ray and Patricia Estabrook won the prestigious Jefferson Award for community service in a star-studded Washington, D.C., ceremony. The Baldacci administration named the Game Loft the state’s top-rated after-school program in 2007 and later designated March 2, 2008, as Game Loft Day.

Not bad for a youth center that began as an improvised solution to a business problem. In 1996, the Estabrooks opened a games-supply store, All About Games, at a mall in Belfast, but the store was soon clogged with teenagers looking for a place to play games. The Estabrooks divided the store into a storefront and a game room, but the gaming presence threatened to overwhelm the store.

Patricia Estabrook remembers a lightbulb moment when she knew the arrangement had to change.

“I was about to sell a high-end chess set to a middle-aged woman when a kid in the other room shouted to a friend, ‘Hey, come take a look at what’s wrong with Batman’s butt,’” she says. “I lost the sale.”

The store was evicted from the mall for its youth presence, but rather than herd the teens out of the store, the Estabrooks decided to create a youth center in combination with the store. They moved All About Games to a downtown location and opened the Game Loft above it in 1998.

The Game Loft was started with a $1,000 grant and the naïve hope that it could be run by volunteers. Within a year, the center was out of money, the Estabrooks were burnt out, and the center was in danger of closing.

Luckily, the Game Loft was awarded the services of Americorps VISTA worker Janea Kelley, whom Estabrook credits with saving the center. Kelley was able to reorganize the Game Loft and write grant proposals to fund a paid staff. Since Kelley’s term there, and with the help of three other VISTA workers, the center has thrived. It also has benefited from an outpouring of support from the United Way, Maine Department of Health and Human Services, local businesses, volunteers, the city of Belfast, and surrounding municipalities.

The Game Loft has attracted such support, says Cherie Galyean, midcoast officer of the Maine Community Foundation (MCF), because of the quality of the program offered at the center.

“They’re so intentional about their program . . . they’re meeting kids where they are . . . they’re always pushing themselves as an organization,” Galyean says, ticking off the organization’s strengths.

The foundation has awarded the center $13,000 over the years, the most recent to fund Game Loft expeditions to outlying communities, including Searsport, Brooks, Islesboro, and Vinalhaven.

The Estabrooks rely on lots of small donations from parents and businesses to make ends meet. Thirty percent of their $100,000 operating budget comes from donors. This year alone annual giving has gone up 75%.

“We wouldn’t be around if it wasn’t for our local support,” Ray Estabrook says.

Game Loft directors have created a structured and supervised gaming program where children as young as 8 can move through different levels, from Pokemon to historical role-playing games. At each level, children have the opportunity to learn new skill-sets, from taking turns to delayed gratification to ethical debate. Gaming sessions often end with facilitated discussion questions. Recently, Estabrook lead a spirited debate after a game over a question that sounded right out of Machiavelli’s The Prince: “Would you rather be an ethical leader who loses or an unethical leader who wins?”

But it isn’t the opportunity for growth that draws children to the Game Loft; it’s the feelings of safety and acceptance. The Game Loft has simple rules to keep everyone safe, including a ban on all physical contact. All are welcome; rule breakers who are ejected one day are welcomed the next. Game Loft youth are encouraged to take roles of responsibility for the center, including daily upkeep, peer support, and serving on the board of directors.

Estabrook says the Game Loft attracts a diverse school crowd, from overachievers to the academically challenged. She estimates that 75% of the youth are males, a vast improvement on the male/female ratio when the center first started. Many who come share a common denominator of thinking outside the box.

“They’re very often square pegs that society has tried to pound into round holes,” she says. “We provide a square hole.”

It was the center’s friendly atmosphere that first attracted Kali Rocheleau. She was a shy 13-year-old girl with few friends the first day she went to the Game Loft. Not only did she feel immediately welcome at the center, but she was encouraged to take part in a group roadside cleanup that very first day; there, she won a prize. Now a retail manager at All About Games and an architectural student at UMaine Auburn, she credits the Game Loft for pulling her out of her shell.

“It was the most welcoming place I had ever been,” Rocheleau says. “Without it, I definitely would have gone through high school without any friends.”
Many parents have been awestruck by such transformations, as well. David Hurley, a resource room educator for the Belfast school system, became involved in the center because he saw it work wonders with two of his sons. In an age of electronic isolation, where text messaging, chat rooms, and online video games are the norm for teens, Hurley says a program like the Game Loft provides a valuable face-to-face opportunity.

“It’s not about programs, it’s about relationships,” says Hurley. “The Game Loft provides this magical doorway where they want to interact with each other.”

Game on!