By Jena Olson
This week we bring you more insights from The AjA Project participant and Crawford High School student Jessica, 16. AjA’s PhotoCity program uses photography to evoke change and growth within our students and their community. When asked, “How would you improve your community?” Jessica writes:
“So maybe City Heights isn’t so bad. Maybe everybody just got in my head by saying negative things about our community.”
Her response serves as a reminder that in the quest for progress and improvement, it can be easy to lose sight of the wonderful qualities the City Heights community already has: a diversity of people, plenty of different restaurants and strong neighborhood involvement through organizations like the Mid-City Community Action Network.
Jessica had one remarkably simple idea for improvement:
“I like it here, but sometimes there is a downside about it. If you think about it, we don’t have Mother Nature’s beauty around. What I mean by that is I rarely see any flowers around.”
Jessica’s photographs of San Diego State University below highlight the kind of natural beauty she would like to see in her own community.
“Parks look empty, playground doesn’t fill it. Flowers make everything look pretty.” If there was more landscaping throughout the community, “maybe people will say less negative things about my hometown.”
