SUMMER 2024

Let’s Play

Director of Student Activities Jeromy Koffler never grows bored of board games.

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Jeromy Koffler holding two of his favorite board games

Photo credit: Chris Brecht

MY FATHER TAUGHT me how to play Checkers, Chess, and Ping-Pong. My mother taught us to play the classics like Clue, Battleship, Boggle, and Yahtzee. Grandma Andrews would invite the parish priest over on Sunday nights to visit and to play Pinochle. Grandma Scranton played a card game called Lucky Thirteen, and she would win nearly every time. Games always brought my family together to laugh and connect.


As I began my career in higher education, I found that it was useful to have a number of games on hand for students to check out. So I started to collect board games (along with your odd prize wheel, trivia buzzer, and rubber chicken). At last count, I have played about 1,300 different games and own approximately 850. And I’m always on the hunt for new ones. In my spare time, I often watch YouTube channels dedicated to new games.

During the pandemic, Talon Strikes Studios launched a Kickstarter campaign for a game called Shadow Network. I liked the way players moved around the map to gain and leak intelligence, so I pledged my support and was invited to send in my mug shots to become a character in the game! Now I will forever be known as a Cold War-era spy based in Rome named Thomas Sweeney.

I love how games get us off our screens, and I also love that they teach me things—I have learned quite a bit about different varieties of birds from playing my favorite game, Wingspan. And then there are the memories that come from playing them. I will never forget getting outwitted by my son, Nick, while playing Undaunted: Normandy. And the time my daughter Anna and I worked together to solve the puzzle-style game Deadline. Or teaching my daughter Abbey to play Lucky Thirteen and imagining Grandma Scranton smiling down on us.

JEROMY KOFFLER, EdD, is the Director of Student Activities.