This blog post is a response to the Meeting of the Minds & Living Cities group blogging event which asks:

“How could cities better connect all their residents to economic opportunity?”

In today’s global economic, social and technological realities, the path to opportunity is not linear. To restore our cities as engines of economic prosperity, it will take the collaborative efforts of leaders from the government, corporations, nonprofits, philanthropy and the arts.

The goal of any urban Challenge Detroit made in detroitcenter is empowering the ingenuity of its leaders to set the foundation for long-term economic opportunity that will advance social equity, promote cultural expression and establish financial stability.

In Detroit, economic prosperity leads the discussion on the regions long-term vitality. Beneath it’s fiscal problems, lay the tenacity of its citizens that are intent on validating to the world that the rebirth of the city and broader region is happening.

In October of 2012, a group of Challenge Detroit Design Thinking Innovationhighly diverse and authoritative individuals met to vision their future for Detroit. Members from Rock Ventures, LLC, the Downtown Detroit Partnership, the City of Detroit, the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation and others, engaged in a collaborative visioning exercise to layout revitalization strategies for the next five years and beyond.

Alumni Fellow Perspective: Vadim Avshalumov

To learn more on this Challenge Detroit Rock Ventures Vadimparticular example of collaboration, we caught up with Vadim Avshalumov, a current Urban Planner with Rock Ventures and an Inaugural Fellow of the Challenge Detroit program. Vadim described the vision of Rock Ventures as the Opportunity Detroit messaging that is supporting downtown Detroit’s recent growth. He illustrated a promising future by creating an environment that attracts businesses, residents and visitors to Detroit by explaining:

“Cities require the amenities and the quality of life that today’s young professional wants: walkability, culture, history, authenticity, and public transportation. The millennial generation is looking for diversity, social-racial inclusion and opportunities for volunteerism.”

Beyond the large companies making financial and strategic investments to connect their employees to the city, there are a number of foundations and non-profits doing exemplary work through social entrepreneurship.

Empowering Social Entrepreneurship

Social innovation is one of Detroit’s dhive buildergreatest tools for solving some of our most difficult challenges. At D:hive, community members are connected with the tools and resources to live, work and engage in their city. It’s physical storefront hosts training to aspiring and established entrepreneurs by connecting them to expert advice and mentorship while they learn in an open, diverse, and highly collaborative environment.

Current Fellows Miguel Davis and Alexandra Zisser recently completed D:hive’s Build Social class which is a 10-week course to learn and develop a business plan alongside the social entrepreneurs making waves in Detroit. Miguel describes their social enterprise as a way to “provide a collaborative space for a free flow of ideas and people with a means for generating revenue to reinvest in the people, places, and ideas that are revitalizing our community.” Like other cities, Detroit will benefit from additional spaces that allow their citizens to mix, mingle and work beyond their home and offices.

Big Data + Social Media = New Era of Collaboration

By taking advantage of the Challenge Detroit Twitter Party widescreentechnologies of our time, we can collaboratively design solutions to the challenges that at one point seemed “too big” or “too expensive” to tackle. At Challenge Detroit, we believe in crowdsourcing innovative ideas during our monthly TweetChat’s to complement the work we do with our partner non-profits.

We leverage this social platform to inspire creative solutions from the community in an open and shared digital atmosphere. These digital landscapes can serve as the canvas for accelerating new ideas. Crowd-sourcing knowledge empowers people to leverage and share their skill sets across industries to create  the most diverse solutions.

See Also: Activating Public Spaces TweetChat Summary

In addition to the partnerships Challenge Detroit is leveraging, there are numerous organizations across the city that are attracting and retaining world-class talent. Both Venture for America and the Detroit Revitalization Fellows programs are invigorating Detroit’s intellectual capital as they combine their resources with other programs to develop a scalable model for urban revitalization.

Through the collaborative efforts of organizations across sectors, Detroit is connecting its residents to economic opportunity by empowering its residents to engage with the resources around them. The future is bright in Detroit!