Determination and Concentration

Last Wednesday, we visited Jane Addams' Hull House Museum. It was interesting because I kind of had a slight epiphany.
I've gone through the past year planning on transfering to the college of urban planning and public affairs. I wanted to concentrate on the public schools and community development. But after hearing about everything that Jane Addams did with the creation of Hull House, I realized that that, what she did, was basically what I want to do. She created a place that acted as a safe haven not just for kids, but for the adults, too. She integrated the neighborhood by bringing rich, educated people into an area that did not have much going for itself. Just the fact that she was able to find people willing to do that shows how determined she was to put this plan into action.
After hearing about the ridicule that Jane Addams received for all her work, I realized that doing something like she did was not just brave, but required a constant state of mind that that's what she was going to do. She had to persevere through rough conditions and hardly any help from other people. And with that determination that she displayed, she was able to change an entire community for the better. She gave everyone hope that things could get better. She provided residents with lessons in various fields so they could get better jobs for themselves. She offered a daycare that was always there for parents, whether or not they could pay the fee. She just put the area in a better state of mind, in a way.
And like I said, that's what I want to do. I want to be able to go into a neighborhood that needs help and be that help. I want to be the one who, by incorporating many of the aspects Jane Addams focused on, can go in there and change things, make them better. But I know it's so much easier said than done. And I'm just not sure if I have the same determination and drive that Jane Addams had. She has, in a sense, become someone who I admire and who I shall aspire to be.

Census Tract

For the assignment that we received the third week of classes, I looked at a few different towns/cities. I looked at Oak Park, Cicero, Chicago, and New Orleans. All four a very prominent places; I spend a lot of time in each place. (Less time in New Orleans for obvious reasons...) Looking at the information presented I'm just a little bit surprised how much the facts show in real life. Like, looking at the numbers, I find myself thinking "Yea, that's true." I mean, the only one that's for, I guess, is the Race/Ethnicity. I've noticed it when it comes to the vacant/occupied housing units, also.
Something that I found interesting was the connection I made (whether or not it's legitimate, we'll see) between the amount of high school graduates and the condition of the city for New Orleans. There's a good 75,000 people, age 25 and over who have not graduated high school. And only that many who have graduated college. For anyone who's been down to New Orleans, they can tell you that it's not all Bourbon Street and French Quarter. That area is strictly just that: an area. The majority of the city is very similar to Chicago's South and West Side. And ever since the hurricane, it's been slightly worse. There are a lot more abandoned houses and buildings: old schoos, storefronts, churches, etc. The condition of the city has never really been amazing. (But it is gorgeous and the people are nicer than ever.) There have always been extensive problems with some neighborhoods such as Uptown and the infamous Ninth Ward. And I can't help but make the connection that some of it is due to the only decent graduation rate.
I also did a quick comparison between Chicago and New Orleans. Ever since the hurricane, the housing occupancy in New Orleans is way lower than it used to be. It now stands at a 69.6% while Chicago is 86.4%. The two cities are so similar in so many ways, on paper and in person. I guess that's what I love being in both of them so much.

Growing up in Oak Park

On Monday, September 24, we had a discussion about the Gay/Lesbian population in various towns and if it has an affect on the diversity of each respective town. I mentioned that I grew up in Oak Park, one of the more liberal suburbs. And I guess I just kind of wanted to elaborate.
For those who don't know, Oak Park is a west suburb just outside the city. It's a relatively small suburb encased between Austin Blvd, Harlem Ave., Roosevelt Rd., and North Ave. With the West Side of Chicago on its eastwen border and River Forest on its western border, Oak Park sits between two very different neighborhoods; the West Side is generally on the lower end of income while River Forest is known for its huge houses and upper-middle-class residents. My house sits one block from River Forest in a good, safe area. I've lived in the same house my entire life, apart from living on campus last semester and this semester. Oak Park is the only town that I know as a residence. And I feel that its liberalism has helped me to grow up being as open minded as I am.
My neighborhood has always had a good mix of people. I never felt like I was only being exposed to one race, religion, etc. I guess it helped that my mom ran a daycare because it really helped me to see different households. There were kids who were adopted, with single parents, with a "normal" nuclear family, different races, and some who were even mentally disabled. But the thing is, it wasn't just at my house where I saw this kind of mix. Walking down the streets of Oak Park, you can see such a mix of people.
When I tell people that I live in Oak Park, they often assume that I'm rich. But quite honestly, not everyone in Oak Park has a whole lot of money. For one, my parents bought our house over 20 years ago, so we're not exactly dealing with today's prices. Sure, they've gone up, and I've actually noticed a change in the people who live in Oak Park. But that's not the point I'm trying to make right now. I guess what I'm trying to say is that there's a mix of income within the residents of Oak Park. Like I said in class, we had Section 8 housing directly across the street from my house for years, all up until the lady who owned the three houses decided to sell the land to a developer. And I'm sure those aren't the only three Section 8 housing houses in Oak Park. While those houses were inhabited, I saw a lot of different people move in and out, a new family almost every year. I never really thought anything of it; I always became friends with whoever lived in the houses. To me, that was what a neighborhood was. I've grown up thinking that places are supposed to be integrated, in every way possible.
But I've realized that there's a lot of places lacking. I guess, in a sense, I'm slightly spoiled in that area. Because I'm so used to a mix of people. When I go out to my cousins' houses out in the west-west suburbs, it throws me off completely. Out there, almost everyone has a very similar income; it's so homogenous out there.
But I'm glad that I grew up in Oak Park. It allowed me to have an open mind from the get-go. And I guess that's why I chose to attend this University. I love being in Chicago because of its vast mix of people. It's like a culture shock to go anywhere else.

Immigration

I took a look at the Metro Chicago Immigration Factbook and found something to be slightly interesting. I came across the map that sorted out the numbers of foreign born by neighborhood. The darkest blue means there's more people who were foreign born. And to my surprise--or just shocked me, really--was the fact that majority of the map of Chicago was a deeper shade of blue. That means that the majority of the neighborhoods have between 18,500 and 47,906 people who are foreign-born. I find that interesting because I wasn't really expecting that, quite honestly. I mean, I know that Chicago is a very diverse city, but it still caught me off guard. I guess I never really thought of it as people being born elsewhere and then moving. I always kind of thought of it as a place of descendants; I just thought everyone's relatives were from elsewhere and people were born here having international descent. It's kind of stupid of me now that I have it down on paper. Well, computer screen, but written down nonetheless.
Oh! Something else that I noticed was the areas with the greatest immigrant population throughout the Chicagoland Area. I guess I wasn't really surprised with this one, but it's just an observation. The Factbook presents a list of ten places that are ranked "in the top 25 metropolitan areas in terms of both the number of immigrants and the percent of their community made up of immigrants." Cicero was on the list having come second in each category: 37,343 individuals, which is 43.6% of its entire population. Like I said, it's not extremely surprising to me, having worked in Cicero and having a lot of friends who live in the town. It's interesting to see the numbers down on paper.

Gentrification

I went to high school at St. Ignatius College Prep. I started going there when the projects along Racine and Roosevelt Road were still up. There used to be a Boys and Girls Club on the southwest corner of Taylor/Racine, and I watched as they tore that down along with the projects. For a while, the fire station on Roosevelt Road was the only thing left on that entire block. I've watched over the past few years as they have started to change the neighborhood with fancier styled housing and pricier stores and restaurants. They goal: gentrification. They are trying to bring riche, more well-to-do people into a neighborhood that hasn't had much going for it for a long while. That's all well and good, but for some reason, this whole process has bothered me. For one, I was deeply upset when I saw the Boys and Girls Club get torn down and replaced with nothing--I've met quite a few of the children who live in the neighborhood and they have nothing to do and nowhere to go after school. And another thing that has really bothered me is that I feel like the phrase "mixed-income housing" is just a big cover-up. It doesn't seem as though they're trying to integrate the neighborhood. It seems more as though they're trying to change the neighborhood; switch up the predominant demographic in the neighborhood. Another thing that my mom brought to my attention is this: St. Ignatius was founded by Father Damen a long time ago. He chose that neighborhood because he wanted the school--and the attached church--to be a safe haven for people living in a not so great neighborhood. He had intentions of being a place for needy people to go to--there was even a soup kitchen open in the basement of the church all up until an unexpected fire shut it down. With the neighborhood changing, it almost seems as though there's no point for the school/church to be in that neighborhood anymore. To me, it seems like it should move into a bad neighborhood, to help them. I don't know, it's complicated. And nothing I say will change what's happening. I'm just not happy with it. Because it's like I said. The neighborhood is just being changed completely. The people who used to live there are being moved to the suburbs and just the outskirts of the city. That's not how it should be.

A Disenchanted World

Ritzer's article talks about various corporations and such that glorify spending money and being "what's in." While reading this article, it really made me think about something that we talked about in my UPP101 course: tourist bubbles. Tourist bubbles are places created by a city to draw profit. For example, Chicago has Milennium Park and all of its various activities. There's also Navy Pier and the Magnificent Mile. All of these draw tourists from all over the country--and even the world--and the city profits from it. Furthermore, througout these locations, there are expensive restaurants and hotels. Since they are the ones offered in the area of the "bubble" those are the ones that tourists tend to stay in--which brings in more profits for the city. These "bubbles" are advertised and glorified making it seem as though they are what they city has to offer. Often times, tourists are so caught up in visiting all of the "tourist bubbles" that they tend to miss out on the real essence of the city--the neighborhoods, the "mom & pop" restaurants and stores, and everything else.
Ritzer's article talks of Cathedrals of Consumption, and I think this is where I made the connection. I guess I just never got that idea out of my head. Because now that I'm looking through it again, I'm realizing that he's talking about stores and malls and such. Either way, both ideas generally come down to this: their main goal is to make money--and lots of it. Places that sell items in bulk do so in order to charge higher prices and places make themselves glamorous so that people have to pay high prices to go there. It seems as though that's everyone's main motive in life these days: get rich quick.