{"id":15941,"date":"2016-05-30T08:00:42","date_gmt":"2016-05-30T08:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/?post_type=blogpost&p=15941"},"modified":"2016-05-30T08:00:42","modified_gmt":"2016-05-30T08:00:42","slug":"fellow-spotlight-gabriela-santiago-romero","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.challengedetroit.org\/blog\/fellow-spotlight-gabriela-santiago-romero\/","title":{"rendered":"Fellow Spotlight: Gabriela Santiago-Romero"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tell us about living in Detroit. What neighborhood do you live in and what things\u00a0<\/strong>make it unique.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Challenge-I live in Southwest Detroit where I grew up as a kid. Southwest is full of\u00a0immigrants, such as my family, and me and we come from all over the world. It\u2019s one of neighborhoods that has stayed strong despite all of the downfall. I grew up here when it\u00a0was completely occupied with people. I loved smelling the different food, hearing the\u00a0different music featuring all types of international artist, and seeing the families all\u00a0interconnect. I grew up with neighbors from Puerto Rico, China, Poland, Albania and\u00a0Iraq. Then things got bad, but many of us couldn\u2019t leave, and some of us didn\u2019t want to\u00a0leave. I was one of the many who wanted to stay and make an impact. I think that\u2019s one\u00a0unique thing about this community and so many others like us currently going through\u00a0change and gentrification. It has devoted residents and community members and\u00a0always has.<\/p>\n

What have you learned from Challenge Detroit so far?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve learned to listen more than\u00a0I speak. That I\u2019m able to lead by scaffolding a good program and recommendations and\u00a0then step back for others to be able to participate. It\u2019s about learning best practices and\u00a0then practicing what you preach in order to truly make a genuine impact. It\u2019s about\u00a0allowing others to become leaders and making sustainable impact.<\/p>\n

Tell us about your host company and your role in the organization.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Livernois-My original host\u00a0company was the Detroit Lions. I had a really fun time working for an NFL organization\u00a0and their community relations team. For someone who only enjoys football for the beer\u00a0and wings, I learned to appreciate the game, the players, and the staff making it all\u00a0happen. It\u2019s a very small team of highly passionate people for the jobs making it look like\u00a0an easy show. It\u2019s not. I was challenged at work more than I have ever been, but it was\u00a0good to see how hard I could work to overcome obstacles. I was lucky enough to hear\u00a0about a job at the Wayne County Executive\u2019s office and applied knowing that it would\u00a0be a guaranteed job after Challenge (the Lions was not) and one in a field that I have\u00a0always been personally interested in, government. I got the job in February and started\u00a0working for the County on my birthday (best birthday gift ever!) and have been happy\u00a0working for a member of Wayne County\u2019s cabinet as an executive assistant. Aside of\u00a0administrative duties, I have the ability to help out on projects and I love learning from\u00a0the executive and his team. There is so much work to do and again, it\u2019s a small team\u00a0doing all the work.<\/p>\n

What kind of impact do you hope to have with your host company and within the\u00a0<\/strong>city?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I hope to be able to work hard and learn all that I can. I hope to be able to\u00a0contribute to Wayne County and its residents in someway. The connections I make and\u00a0the network I have is also great when it comes to working on community projects I\u00a0spearhead on my own.<\/p>\n

How as being a Detroit native impacted your experience as a Challenge Detroit\u00a0<\/strong>Fellow?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"FellowsIt has been really difficult. It\u2019s kind of upsetting sometimes learning about all of\u00a0the issues in Detroit and caring about gentrification more than others that we come\u00a0across in our work, but it\u2019s a part of the process. It\u2019s also been exciting getting to learn\u00a0about cool places that I have never heard about like Raven Lounge! It just makes me\u00a0realize how much I still don\u2019t know and reminds me why I love this city so much.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

To learn even more about Gabriela’s experience in Detroit and as a Challenge Detroit fellow check out her spotlight video below.<\/p>\n