The City of San Carlos was seeking an affordable way to engage youth with their outdoor spaces and programming. As their 2025 Centennial anniversary approached, they were looking to get both their Youth Advisory Council and local organizations involved in the programming as well.
The City of San Carlos was looking for an alternative to Pokémon GO! to get people to explore the beautiful outdoor spaces around the city and learn about local history. The City of San Carlos has a Mission scheduled for each month in 2025, centering around a different local organization.
“We really wanted local organizations to sponsor the Mission by providing knowledge rather than money,” says Emma Licko, Youth Development Recreation Coordinator at the City of San Carlos. “I didn’t want the missions to be focused on one park, because we have so much history in every park.” The City of San Carlos Recreation team and Youth Advisory Council reached out to local organizations to ask them for trivia about themselves and their history.
The Youth Advisory helped to make the content relatable for youth and families. Organizations who didn’t want to build Missions could also show support by providing small prizes for the Missions. “It’s really important to have little mementos to remember the Missions, and it incentivized people to visit the Youth Center and other community organizations to pick up their prizes.”
Emma was happy when her first Mission went live, even if she had to make small tweaks later. “It can be daunting to publish a Mission, but we just had to be brave enough to put the first one out there. We had almost 250 players in the first two months. Even in our first week, we had over 200.”
Emma also felt the price was right. “The pricing was affordable, allowing us to purchase a subscription for 3 years and build upon every year. It has so many options to easily engage our community.” With a smaller department, Emma wanted to be sure to use her budget effectively. She was quick to put up signage and start promoting Missions online to gain players early on.
Emma Licko
Youth Development Recreation Coordinator
City of San Carlos Parks and Recreation