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Youth Exhibit Interactive Installation Project Dealing With the Issue of Gentrification

DIVAS for Social Justice hosted the second annual STEAM (Science Technology Engineering Arts Math) Awards at Weeksville Heritage Center on August 15, 2014.

DIVAS for Social Justice hosted the second annual STEAM (Science Technology Engineering Arts Math) Awards at Weeksville Heritage Center on August 15, 2014. The awards ceremony commemorated the last day of STEAM camp and featured an interactive installation project about the issue of gentrification in Bedford Stuyvesant.

Youth ages, 7-15, were trained in Digital Media, 3D Printing, Robotics, Data Visualization and Mapping. The camp was facilitated by: Clarisa James-3D Printing and Digital Media, Andrea Calloway-Robotics, Murray Cox, Data Visualization & Mapping, DeAngela Duff-Adobe After Effects, and Gerard Miller- Financial Literacy. With the skills they obtained, campers were able to create an installation project which featured all of the different mediums they learned.

The installation project featured 3D designed Brownstones by the youth that were placed on a map of Bedford Stuyvesant identifying where they lived and there solutions to displacement.

Some of the solutions that were identified in the installation were providing more green spaces in vacant lots, affordable housing for all to reduce the homeless rate in Bed Stuy and communal dinners to have community conversations for an all inclusive neighborhood using lego pieces. Youth also programmed and built a robot to keep the community clean for all.

STEAM participants share with their community about their experience in camp.
STEAM participants share with their community about their experience in camp.

In addition to the installation project, photos were exhibited of Stuyvesant Heights and Lafayette Ave to show the contrast in the community. A short film was also produced by the youth featuring community residents, politicians and organizers who shared their definition of gentrification and solutions to displacement.

The organization is hoping that the installation project can be featured at future community events in Bedford Stuyvesant dealing with the issue of gentrification.




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