Daily Archives: August 13, 2019

A New Normal by Alyssa Trinko

This summer has been one of the most amazing summers of my life. I have learned so much in such a short amount of time. I have fallen in love with Indianapolis and found a home there. I’ve also fallen in love with the Harrison Center and the work the incredible staff is doing to create positive change in Indy.

The Harrison Center builds relationships with the residents and business owners of Indianapolis neighborhoods so they can help make neighborhoods healthy, foster community identity, and work on renewal in the city. Art is central to this work. The Harrison Center is home to 32 resident artists, many of whom are creative placemakers and collaborate with the Center for city projects. The “city side” of the Center works on building these close relationships with people all over the city and engaging them through art and other creative mediums like public art events, public art installations, porching, and other creative placemaking tools.

This form of activism is innovative and, though it continues to gain popularity across the country, it is still unconventional. I had never heard of creative placemaking until I came here. On the first day of my internship, my internship coordinator, Moriah, told me we would all be attending a porch party for lunch. I was very confused as to why we would be eating lunch in a neighbor’s yard in the middle of the work day. By the end of my first week, I was quickly starting to understand why.

This summer, we worked specifically in the Martindale-Brightwood neighborhood of Indianapolis. All of my internship projects were focused on connecting this neighborhood’s past to the present. The goal of the work is to invite new residents and business owners in the area into the existing stories and traditions of the neighborhood as it continues to experience gentrification. This kind of community engagement the Harrison Center does unites the community, and it eliminates racial inequity.

I organized a storytelling night for the residents of Martindale-Brightwood to share their stories with new neighbors. I also co-created an art show with fashion pieces that celebrated neighborhood matriarchs. I spent a lot of time porching with residents, interviewing them, and taking their photographs. Resident artists painted these older residents’ portraits and they were turned into billboards, postcards, and shown at exhibitions for all of Indy to see. All of these initiatives are examples of creative placemaking.

The work the Harrison Center does is hard. It takes years of effort, dedication, and a strong belief in the cause. It truly takes a village, but it works. In just two months, I was able to witness a community in Indianapolis become closer, more loving, more understanding, and stronger. The Harrison Center has shown me the meaning of community, how to build it, and what it can offer us as humans. It has shown me what a neighborhood really looks like, and that we desperately need close-knit, healthy neighborhoods with identity and culture now more than ever. As I leave Indianapolis, I feel confident that I can take what I’ve learned here and bring it to my own community.

The Importance of Knowledge by Jade Curless

After finally retreating home from our nation’s capital, I have finally been able to reflect on the significance of my CAPS experience and what it has taught me. After working at Venn Strategies this summer, I have gained numerous professional skills and an overall deeper understanding of how politics functions in the United States. Working at a governmental affairs firm has provided me with a much more in-depth view of how our government operates and how policy is a constant battle.

As a general research intern at Venn, I was able to work on a variety of issues. I did research on the devastating maternal mortality rate in the U.S., a crisis where black mothers die at a rate 3 to 4 times greater than their white counterparts despite the socioeconomic conditions. I also had an ongoing project where I researched the upcoming revisions of the Dietary Guidelines. I learned about the importance of limiting the influence of big food and pharmaceutical companies, ensuring a scientific-based Dietary Guidelines for the country. These experiences, and many more, taught me the importance of knowledge and the necessity to be aware. In this current political climate, there seems to be an abundance of problems but only a number of solutions. Being able to watch congressional committee and caucus meetings, I discovered how much influence the American people have. There are many congresspeople who are passionate about solving these social and economic issues, however, their voice is constrained when they don’t have adequate support from their constituents. Working in Washington did confirm my suspicion that big money influences a large amount of how our government functions; however, there are politicians, lobbyists, investigator generals, and many others that a ready to change this norm. For a government to be representative of the people, the people must be passionate about being represented. There is a reasonable mistrust between the people and the government, specifically for minority groups. And while I and many others are unable to fully understand those experiences, that doesn’t mean that this isn’t the time to fight for their platform. It is necessary that our country allows everyone to be represented and more importantly supports them to be their own advocates.

My sociology education has made me critical of our society, but my CAPS experience has made me realistic on how to shift these social structures. Working in such a political environment showed me the significance of being aware and knowledgeable of current issues. There are a lot of underlying barriers that make it difficult for everyone to be represented, but my internship taught me that there are a lot of people trying to change that. Knowledge is a powerful tool, and if we want things to change this upcoming 2020 election, then this tool needs to be as accessible as possible for everyone.