In a Detroit neighborhood shared by Bangladeshi, Polish immigrants, longtime African-American residents and young artists, something is happening.

In her book “Redevelopment and Race: Planning a Finer City in Postwar Detroit,” U-M Professor June Manning Thomas explores what went wrong, demonstrating how and why government programs were ineffective and even destructive to community needs.

For more than a decade, the Edward Ginsberg Center for Community Service and Learning at the University of Michigan has been hosting a variety of programs and services for students and assisting faculty in the development of engaged learning in their courses and programs.

The U-M Law School’s Detroit Center for Family Advocacy (CFA) provides legal advocacy and social work services to low-income families to prevent the unnecessary placement and prolonged stay of children in foster care while also providing valuable training and experiences to law students.

The alarming increase of childhood obesity and other preventable cardiovascular risk factors compelled Dr. Kim Eagle to create Project Healthy Schools (PHS) — a community-University of Michigan Health System collaborative that provides a school-based program to reduce childhood obesity and its long-term health risks.

Throughout the year, the Detroit Center hosts meetings, lectures, workshops, and performances, annually drawing more than 20,000 visitors.

How does a city grappling with how to thrive in the present day begin to think about what it will look like 50 years down the road? That was a question the Detroiters Working for Environmental Justice (DWEJ) wanted answered when it assembled the Detroit Climate Action Collaborative (DCAC) in 2011.

Alleys, vacant lots and underutilized urban spaces hold great potential for fostering more sustainable cities.

Elizabeth Birr Moje, the associate dean for research and community engagement and an Arthur F. Thurnau Professor in the School of Education at the University of Michigan, focuses her research on communities and schools in Detroit.