This week our group aimed to complete a recording of our podcast and our write-up. We have successfully completed both and hope to use the research required from the write up to add to the narration of the podcast. Through completing the write up, we learned about how the youth’s perspectives of the revitalization compare and contrast with academic research. We hope to incorporate this contrast within the podcast
With this in mind, one of our massive lessons from this week as well as this course as a whole has been the distinction between resident perspective and academic articles. We have learned the importance of evaluating both perspectives to fully understand any urban issue, as it has been crucial in our evolving understanding of youth in Regent Park.
This week’s group session taught us that the residents of Regent Park have a unique opportunity with regards to the redevelopment, recently achieving about $26.8 million in funding towards a community economic development program from developers at Tridel Builders Inc. As we’ve understood, the Community Benefits Oversight Working Group is an organization of Regent Park tenants working with Tridel and the TCHC in order to equitably use this funding. Our conversation touched on ways the community is organizing their voice in order to have the most agency over this new funding, as well as effective ways it can be allocated. Jobs were a topic of discussion as to how ineffective of a method it can be to uplift the neighborhood. When considering a decent salary for a single person multiplied by the thousands that reside in Regent Park, the $26 million would grow scarce in just a few years. We discussed social programs, education opportunities and other methods that would have much more yield from the perspective of our resident partners.
This is Fatiha at 16 in Morocco. She wanted to be a fashion designer but nobody took her seriously.
This week was probably the most task-demanding in relation to previous weeks, as this week we had our final group discussion about the overall research question and Regent Park more broadly. Kaylee, who is American, had made a trip back home for Thanksgiving during our class on Thursday, which left Daniel, Rabia, Murshida, Fatiha and Miguel leading the discussion. It was challenging not having a member present this week, and it was also challenging from the production side as a separate event was held at the same time in the Daniels Spectrum building, which put pressure on our FOCUS production team having to multitask. We would like to give a special thanks to them for this week and previous weeks they’ve helped us make this production a reality.
We have made extreme strides in recording and executing our project in the past two weeks but still have much work ahead. We have struggled thus far to cooperate in finding a vision thus far, but recently we feel a joint vision is coming together as the project is nearing completion. Specifically residents have had different passions to study such as crime, drowing rates, and the ability to rent an apartment in Regent Park with the TCHC waiting list. We feel the topic of youth allowed us to address the underlying theme of these topics and address a shared interest of all members, most of whom are parents.
With the recording being complete, this upcoming week Daniel and Kaylee will be working to edit together the podcast. Once the podcast is edited Kaylee’s narration lines will be written and recorded. Although we have lots of work ahead in the upcoming week, we are excited to see what final lessons we can gain from this study.
Since youth were the inspiration for our project, we thought it would be useful to get in touch with ourselves as youth, to help aid in our understanding of people currently in their youth. We have asked all of our group members to provide us with a screenshot into their youth to remember where we all began.
This is Miguel at age 5.
This is Murshida at 17 years old graduating from Western technical commercial school.
This is Kaylee in 2010 or 2011. She was about 9 years old and at a swim meet.
Regent Park Radio Shack: Daniel, Fatiha, Kaylee, Miguel, Murshida, and Rabia