Troy University’s Rosa Parks Museum is working to create a mobile app that will engage its visitors, especially young people.

The Museum is teaming up with QuantumERA, LLC, an immersive solutions company, to create the “Rosa Parks and the Women who Made the Movement” mobile application, which will feature a virtual Rosa Parks and other unsung figures of the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Visitors will meet the virtual Mrs. Parks and other foot soldiers of the movement on the second floor of the Children’s Wing, which will inspire them to learn more about Mrs. Parks’ life and activism as well as the individuals and strategies that made the boycott a success.

The Museum is currently raising funds for the app’s development and hopes to launch the app in 2023. Those interested in helping in this effort can make gifts online at https://troy.scalefunder.com/cfund/project/31774.  

The second floor of the Children’s Wing contains images of the figures and events pertinent to the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the early Civil Rights Movement. Upon entering that area of the museum, the students will be challenged through the app to complete a scavenger hunt through the exhibit and create a scrapbook of their experience with original source documents and archive photos as they are challenged to answer questions about the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the people who fought for equitable treatment. The Rosa Parks Museum will provide a set of iPads for visitors to use with the app, but it will also can be downloaded on a visitor’s personal mobile device.

“Our goal with this app is to engage all visitors, but especially students on an emotional level and provide them with a series of immersive but educational experiences that will help them to better understand the political and racial oppression of Jim Crow segregation and the people, many of whom have often been overlooked, who fought to gain the rights and freedoms granted under the U.S. Constitution,” said Donna Beisel, the Museum’s Assistant Director. “Creating experiences and interactions that engage the students through interactive augmented reality learning activities will help younger generations understand the bravery it took for ordinary people to stand up in the face of overt intimidation and violence.”

Located on the University’s Montgomery Campus on the spot of Mrs. Parks’ historic 1955 arrest, the museum opened on Dec. 1, 2000, with the mission of interpreting the story and lasting legacy of Mrs. Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott for future generations. Constructed on the site of the former Empire Theater, the museum has become a major landmark in the revitalization of downtown Montgomery and annually draws visitors from throughout the country and around the world.