http://www.dukeengagedetroit.org/detroit-news/dukes-nick-prys-on-detroit

Though it may require swallowing our pride, sometimes coming home is the best feeling in the world.  Just ask LeBron James about his return to Cleveland. As a native of Cleveland’s suburbs myself, I’ve forgiven LeBron’s mistakes and embraced his homecoming - truly a homecoming for the ages. Speaking about coming home, the beauty of home is that it is unique to every person. For me, it means a collection of little things, including hearing the sound of my mother cooking dinner and and the laughter of my little sister. For LeBron, it may mean hearing the supportive chants of millions of basketball fans.

Like LeBron, Nick Prys also knows about staying true to his home. A 2014 Duke graduate and native Detroiter, Nick Prys submitted a winning video for Challenge Detroit – a yearlong program that enables participants to tackle some of the city’s toughest challenges, from restoring abandoned buildings to improving the public school system. Along with some friends, he’s working on a startup called Clove, a grocery vending service that will cut out supermarkets as the middleman and improve food consumption efficiency. 

When I revisited the Detroit News link, I realized that this was the same Nick that I had met last Friday at a local entrepreneurial mixer at TechTown. Rocking a plaid shirt and cleanly cropped facial hair, Nick spoke to me with a slow, measured voice about his experiences growing up in the city. He told me about how he had taken his friends to see the abandoned Packard Plant, and how he’d be willing to take me there before I leave. He’s one of those rare individuals that I could be real with from the start.

In the video, Nick Prys explains his deep roots to Detroit and why he's willing to stay and work in his hometown after graduation. His video reminds me of the line in the song Pompeii by Bastille, which goes, "Oh, where do we begin? The rumble or our sins?" In other words, what should changemakers focus on to revitalize Detroit-  the physical ruins of abandoned structures, or the systemic corruption and failed policies of the last five decades? Beautiful montages of the city, featuring highlights such as Downtown street art and the vibrant restaurants of Greektown and Corktown, are spliced with shots of Nick riding his bike through barren lots and storefronts. Set to a nostalgic rock ballad, he almost convinces me to stay in Detroit. Almost. 

Similar to the LeBron Situation, I both applaud his loyalty and wonder why he would choose to stay in Detroit. Just one glance at current media coverage can repel the bravest tourists from traversing the treacherous paths of Gratiot Street and 8 Mile Road – the same 8 Mile of Eminem/Slim Shady/Marshall Mathers infamy. And as Nick mentions himself, why would people choose to live in Detroit, a city that provokes pity and apathy rather than awe, over LA, New York, or Boston? Sure, there is innovation and creative energy. Sure, there’s hope and a collective sense of ownership among the city’s people. Whether we see this energy and community drive sustainable change is entirely another question. 

The first time I watched Nick Prys’ video (shout out to Kiran for sharing it with us), I was inspired. The second time, I did a slow clap in my head. The third time, I felt a mixture of disbelief and respect. When I watched the video a fourth time a few minutes ago, my response was more measured and critical – Nick made a video of the highlights of the city, like how Facebook shows the highlights of our lives, while it brushes past some of the city’s more serious issues – broken infrastructure, blight, poverty, and violent crime, to name a few. 

Detroit, from its heyday in the 1950s to its present state, can be summarized with this line from Pompeii: "Many days fell away with nothing to show, and the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love." As more and more people fled to city for the outlying suburbs, Detroit became a vestige of its former self. So as Bastille later sings, and I echo, "How am I going to be an optimist about this?" Nick largely relies on emotion rather than reason to make his points, which may be an effective way to make an inspiring video, but not enough to persuade policymakers and dangerous in the long run. For every Edison District and Cass Creative Corridor, there are dozens of broken houses, broken homes, and homes being broken into. Such problems cannot not fixed by only young entrepreneurs, and require support from local government and the black majority population. 

Will Detroit remain in the ashes or will it soar like the legend of the phoenix? Every end has a beginning, and only time will tell if Detroit gets lucky. So as I travel to the Packard Plant with Nick later this week, I’ll have to remind myself that he considers all of Detroit, including its forgotten rubble, to be part of his home, and that is a beautiful thing indeed.

Last week I talked about social entrepreneurship as sustainable change that is being enacted. To me, this is the corner stone of what I am doing here in Detroit. In creating Small Batch Detroit, I am helping to make Detroit Food Academy even more sustainable. The goal of creating Small Batch Detroit is to provide a sustainable funding source for Detroit Food Academy so it does not have to rely solely on donations and grants, raise awareness for Detroit Food Academy and offer gainful employment for graduates of the academy. To me, this project incorporates solutions for many of the growing problems not only in Detroit, but around the country. Through creating a program based on food, high schoolers are taught about the choices they make every day and ways for them to lead healthier more fulfilling lives. Beyond living a healthier life, the young adults are learning how to create their own business plans and resumes so that they can take control of their own life. In teaching them these skills, the kids are learning how to empower themselves. This empowerment not only helps the high schoolers learn to make nutritious choices, and learn skills that will help them through life, but in teaching the kids how to empower themselves it, in my opinion, is also teaching them the value of education and the need for them to at least finish their high school careers, and in some cases go on to college. 

In my personal opinion, one of the most important things to invest in, invest time, money, effort, and everything in between, is in education. Without education the cycles of poverty cannot be broken because the causes are still there. With education, people are empowered to think for themselves and find their own ways out of the troubles they are going through. This in turn allows them to pass the knowledge to their kids and thus break out of the constant cycles of poverty that people find themselves trapped in. When looking at Detroit as whole, I believe that this lack of investment in education was a large factor of the downfall of the auto industry. Many auto manufacturers didn’t put the proper investment into technology and allowed East Asian companies to push ahead. With education, and investment in education, it allows entire societies to stay on the cutting edge of technology. While there were educated individuals in and around Detroit, the mentality, in my opinion, was too focused on return-on-investment rather than the future. Detroit Food Academy isn’t looking at return-on-investment, it is looking at building the pathways to create a better future, and is doing so by investing itself in education and empowering individuals. It is this mentality, one of sustainability and looking into the future, that is the most important thing my project helps to bring to Detroit Food Academy, and to Detroit as a whole.

    An example of social entrepreneurship that I have observed in Detroit was during the conference on Friday. Capuchin Soup Kitchen sponsors a bakery called On the Rise in Detroit, Michigan. The bakery is run by the members of ROPE, which stands for Reaching Our Potential Everyday. The participants in this program are people who were recently released from prison or have completed substance abuse treatment programs. This program helps the men in this program turn their lives around and inspire them to create their own businesses once they have discovered their own niche. The purchases made from this program go back to supporting counseling services, housing and other help programs. The community within Detroit helps this business remain successful.

    After looking at that example, social entrepreneurship has many meanings to me. It means that that someone is following their passion and dedicating all their efforts to make others fall in love with their passion as well. It means that you want to create your own innovative path to accomplish a goal. Social entrepreneurship also incorporates a way to give back to the community. Examples of social entrepreneurship that I have witnessed, including the example above, have shown how these businesses are always finding new ways to serve others and make their environment a better place. There is always a way of involving others and creating building blocks to make the enterprise grow.  It is important in this world that we live in because every day things are constantly changing.

    “Sometimes people ask me why am I so excited about what I do. My reply mostly is, "You see one celebrity and get excited. I see several hundred thousand future celebrities, change makers, and world movers, every day.” 
― Sharad Vivek Sagar

    Working within TechTown every day shows me how accurate this quote is pertaining to social entrepreneurship. The idea to be financially successful is not the only goal. There is a larger goal which is creating an impact within the world as “change makers” or “world movers”.

    “I hope to break even while helping as many people as I can and truly making an impact”.

    This statement was made by someone on stage when they asked what he truly hopes to happen with his business within the next year. The world needs social entrepreneurs who can produce new ideas that can help keep up with the changing pace of society. Also, the world needs sustainability and innovation and social entrepreneurship can offer these two things in the long run.