The project builds on Tawanna Dillahunt and Julie Hui’s partnership with the Friends of Parkside to pilot a “community tech worker” program to assist seniors requiring technology-related support. Tech workers will be embedded at Jefferson East to develop a sustainable, useful model that will help bridge the digital divide for small businesses. 

“To maximize our impact, each team is focusing on one specific area of need so we can address that same problem in multiple companies and develop expertise in that area. As a result, we have eight teams: four focusing on marketing problems and four focusing on operations.”
~ Michael Willard

Importantly, the survey results demonstrate that vaccine hesitancy is surmountable. More than 1 in 3 residents (34%) who reported being unlikely to get vaccinated between January and March 2021 have since received at least one dose of the vaccine. 

As COVID-19  swept across the city of Detroit, it brought with it a wave of food insecurity, particularly among low-income residents and seniors who rely on public transportation and can only afford to buy small amounts of food at a time. Now, a U-M research team has stepped in to help identify solutions. 

Survey results suggest that many families are struggling with rising costs and food shortages. Sixty-five percent of Detroit households report spending more at the grocery store in the last month, while 71% of those who report not having enough to eat in the past week point to the prohibitively high cost of food as a cause of their insecurity.

Modeled after a design studio, small teams of students will work with a portfolio of business owners within certain industry sectors to identify immediate needs and develop solutions. This approach should allow students to perform substantive work without overly burdening business owners who may be in crisis.

Students in the two-week program will get instruction and also wrap-around services, such as college application workshops, and writing workshops, mentored by U-M students, professional engineers, and U-M alumni.

“I hope that the work of our foundation, and the people we have invested in, will create a ripple effect of social justice for years to come.”
~ David Bohnett

“We have a team of interdisciplinary students responding in various ways: law students researching legal questions related to Small Business Administration lending, public policy students creating easy to understand guides, and design students designing templates for businesses moving to online sales.”
~ Justin Erickson, program manager for the Detroit Neighborhood Entrepreneurs Project.