In February I wrote a blog post reflecting on my first months as a fellow, where I said: “it’s astounding how much Detroit has to offer you, and Challenge Detroit will give you the tools you need to experience this city to the fullest”
Sixth months later, as I am officially wrapping up my last week […]
It’s hard to believe July is almost over- tomorrow marks the beginning of our last month as Challenge Detroit Fellows, and the end of our final Challenge. For the past 5 Fridays, we’ve changed up our usual challenge structure of all working with one non-profit partner in favor of individual or small group impact projects. […]
Have you heard of the StartingBloc institute? StartingBloc is a 5 day institute for innovators, activists do-gooders, big thinkers, and anyone else interested in creating change through their work. They hold a number of institutes every year, and their alumni network is vast-spanning industries and countries.
I had never heard of StartingBloc until earlier this year when […]
Hang around a group of Challenge Detroit fellows on any given Friday and there’s a phrase you’re guaranteed to hear: Design Thinking. It’s the problem-solving methodology we use in our approach to all our team challenges, and it’s completely opened my eyes to the hidden design (both in the physical and processes sense) that goes […]
Have you been following Detroit in the news for the past few months? If you have, you’ve probably been hearing a lot about the Detroit Institute of Arts. The Detroit Institute of Arts, or DIA, has been in heavy media rotation as the fate of its impressive collection is eyed for city debt repayment (Detroit’s […]
There have been a lot of really great things about my time in Detroit so far, and one of them has without a doubt been the weather. Well, maybe not the weather exactly- coming off of four years in Southern California, Michigan’s record breaking winter has certainly been an adjustment. But despite countless cold and […]
It’s astounding how much your life can change in a year. 365 days ago, I was a college senior in Southern California. It’s Monday, so I was probably sitting in my American Political Thought class, strategizing at what point during the day I could find the time to run home and move my street-parked car […]
For the past 6 months, I have been happy to call Detroit’s West Village neighborhood “home”. Located on Detroit’s East Side about two miles outside of the city’s vibrant central district, West Village is one in a cluster of historic neighborhoods, characterized by beautiful historic homes, tree-lined streets, and the diversity of its residents. This […]
You hear a lot about urban gardening and urban agriculture in Detroit. There’s something undeniably symbolic and hopeful in watching new, green life thrive in the vacant lots of what was once the United States’ fourth largest city.
You wouldn’t know about it from the news, but there’s another kind of gardening sprouting up in Detroit: […]
It’s the end of November, which can only mean one thing: Thanksgiving- followed closely by Black Friday. A holiday diphthong, the quintessentially American day of turkey, football, and family, is inevitably followed – and increasingly overshadowed – by the frenzied day of deals, discounts, and trampled shoppers.
Black Friday has been surrounded by a cloud of […]