This summer, I came across an article titled “Litterati: A Global Digital Landfill of Instagrammed Trash”… Instagram? Click.

Litterati envisions a litter-free world. Somewhat ironically, one of the coolest things that I have ever seen that’s featured on their website is the exact opposite: an impact map that let’s you visualize the collective mess we’ve created across the entire planet (be patient, it takes some time to load). Each little data blip on the map denotes how many pieces of trash have been picked up, geo-tagged, and uploaded to Instagram with the hashtag #litterati.

Having just moved to Detroit, I obviously honed in on this area on the map and was forced to draw one of two conclusions: Detroit is the cleanest city ever (like sterile clean) or that no one in Detroit has heard of Litterati. The latter, I was sure, and also sure that the timing wasn’t right to start uploading pictures of trash to my Instagram with a secret society-esque sounding name right before meeting all of the fellows. It would have to wait.

Enter September, the fellows, and the social media challenge. Eager to put Detroit on the figurative and now literal impact map, I shared the Litterati vision with fellows and we developed a plan to pick up trash. Lots of it. And all over the 144 square miles of Detroit. Let’s make Detroit a little cleaner, we said, but also bring awareness to a meaningful global environmental movement, announce to Detroiters that we’re proud to be here in a measurable way, and have a damn good time doing it.

In all, 52 men, women, and children picked up over 2,000 pieces of litter in 9 different communities across Detroit from 1-2 pm on Saturday, November 16. We #litterati-ed so many pieces of trash so quickly that Instagram deactivated our team account! We were intentional in making the event an hour long to showcase how much can be accomplished in a short period of time. We were intentional in keeping the number of non-Challenge Detroit participants to a minimum to showcase what can be accomplished by a small, dedicated group. Unintentionally, we inspired people to take action outside of our community. Within 48 hours of the event, I was contacted by Jeff Kirschner, the founder of Litterati, with news that multiple organizations had approached him about replicating our event.

I speak for all of Challenge Detroit when I say that we are proud to have contributed to this movement both inside and outside of our city, and that we look forward to the next opportunity to serve our community and the planet.

– Miguel Davis, Fellow @ Macro Connect, Inc.

This event was funded in full by Macro Connect, Inc. and Strategic Staffing Solutions, two of the companies in Challenge Detroit’s portfolio of host companies.

An additional thanks goes out to Jeff Kirschner, the founder of Litterati, and the entire Challenge Detroit service committee for their work in planning and executing the event.

Service committee members: Tiara Adams, Anna Balzer (co-chair), Meiyi Cheng, Katie Dictus, Cody Grant, Brandi Keeler, Max Kurek, Calyssa Lawyer, Jaber Saad, Carlos Spearman (co-chair), Sami Szeszulski.