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Reflection

Sara Abdulrazzak reflects on her experience volunteering in Detroit and learning about urban blight. She was surprised to learn over half of Detroit is vacant. Volunteering with trash cleanups, she saw the endless vacant properties and dangerous trash firsthand. While projects aiming to help at-risk youth seemed promising, they faced challenges in funding and access to resources. Large group projects worked well when all contributed, but not everyone put in equal effort. The most important lessons were that small-scale local projects can have impact, but large-scale ones rely on groups where individual roles feel small. Government intervention like the Detroit Land Bank is most effective for managing abandoned land, but citizens also have a role to play in addressing

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68 views3 pages

Reflection

Sara Abdulrazzak reflects on her experience volunteering in Detroit and learning about urban blight. She was surprised to learn over half of Detroit is vacant. Volunteering with trash cleanups, she saw the endless vacant properties and dangerous trash firsthand. While projects aiming to help at-risk youth seemed promising, they faced challenges in funding and access to resources. Large group projects worked well when all contributed, but not everyone put in equal effort. The most important lessons were that small-scale local projects can have impact, but large-scale ones rely on groups where individual roles feel small. Government intervention like the Detroit Land Bank is most effective for managing abandoned land, but citizens also have a role to play in addressing

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api-335240382
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Abdulrazzak 1

Sara Abdulrazzak

Dr. Moran

Political Sciences 1010

26 April 2017

End of Semester Reflection

Upon conducting extensive research on blight and its effect on Detroit, I was surprised to

learn that over half of Detroit is vacant. It is insane to imagine that a place that was livelily and

robust is now almost a ghost town. While volunteering with the Wayne State Community of

Scholars and Wolverine Humane Society I realized just how awful blight and neighborhood

deterioration is. Our group participated in a trash and rubble clean up day and it was shocking for

me to witness the endless streets of vacant property and dangerous trash. The most common

pieces of trash that I picked up included chips and candy wrappers and beer/ whiskey bottles.

The area looked terrifying due to its uncontained landscape and crumbling buildings. Another

group we volunteered with was the Urban Development Corporation, which aimed to bring

employment opportunities to at risk youth. We were assigned a vacant lot on Mt. Elliot St in a

business road. The project however was not completed due to a shortage in funding and the

limited access to market wealth. However though projects like these seem promising and crucial,

I dont think I would continue working on this problem. I personally find that I am more

passionate about problems that directly affect the people such as health care and rising obesity

rates.

After completing this class, I realized that large projects work extremely well when the

students are a part of a group, however I also realized that it is difficult to completely see eye to

eye with all group members thus causing a strain in our project. Some people are willing to put
Abdulrazzak 2

in more effort while others, not so much. It is however helpful to share responsibilities with

others or else it becomes too overwhelming.

The most important lesson that I learned is that there are two main ways to be personally

involved. You can be involved in a small-scale project through the civic and family sphere and

hold a large role, however the end result may be relatively small. Or you can be a small

individual that works on large projects in the market and government sphere that are largely

effective but heavily reliant on a large group, making your role seem relatively small.

Additionally, I learned that though not all Americans see eye to eye an all topics, you might find

many overlaps with people supporting opposing parties. It is for this reason that it is better to

cooperate and learn about the similarities rather than dwell on the differences.

Of all the services we participated in, the most significant one in my opinion was the

Community of Scholars alliance with the Wolverine Humane Society. I felt like that trip truly

opened my eyes to the problem. Prior to participating, a large majority of my research was off

site with the exception of meeting with Vanessa from the Urban Development Corporation. The

area looked as though it was not suitable to support humans. In addition, despite the long hours

we put in, the land looked very similar to how it looked before. If I had the opportunity to go

through this course again, I would look try to find another focused project besides the lot project

with Vanessa. I know it will be almost impossible to find funding from large businesses and had I

known that the Urban Development Corporation was looking for these types projects from the

beginning, I would have chosen a project that would be more likely to yield tangible results in

the time span we are given.

In the end the most effective way to tackle blight is through government intervention like

that of the Detroit Land Bank Authority. Policies like this mainly function to ensure maximum
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damage control. The govt being responsible for large sections of abandoned land makes it easier

to keep all records and status reports organized. In addition the government has a large pool of

wealth that it can allocate to certain initiatives including the revitalization of inner-city

neighborhoods. However, there are several issues plaguing Detroit and blight is only one of them

so it is not only the responsibility of the government to address this issue. A good citizen is one

that will go out of their way and aid in the efforts of eliminating the problem. The action does not

need to be significant in size but its results should be impactful to the local community so that

their quality of life improves, even if it is just a little bit.

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