Scottie Gilg- Field Trip into Newport News (Free Response 4)

In my Writing Intensive, Writing about the Environment, we are partnering with Newport News firefighters to make policies that could be implemented in Newport News to make it a better, safer place. My policy group discusses the building blight that is in Newport News. This can include vacant lots, abandoned buildings, buildings that are not kept up by landlords, and many more. 


On Tuesday, March 14th, we took a field trip and went around the neighborhoods in Newport News. We went to vacant buildings, places where crime rates were the highest, and the coal port that plagues the community with high levels of coal dust and pollution in general. As we were in South Newport News our community partner showed us a house that a man burned down because he and another man got into an argument. The house was black from flames and the shutters were melted. We went past another corner where 3 men were standing outside of a small grocery store. He told us that he had told these men to stop standing there because there have been times when someone will come up and shoot people at that corner and it is unsafe for them. He said they have considered closing the shop, but that would lead to a food desert in that community because there are no other food stores near there. Going and seeing these places showed me the importance of trying to find different ways to prevent future building blight. It was very interesting to see the difference in what the structures look like at CNU compared to places only 10 minutes away. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Nature Walk

 I took a walk around the Noland trail last week to just be able to say I have done it before my time ends at CNU. This was always a bucket list thing to do and after the 6-mile walk, I wish I had done it a lot earlier. I felt at peace during the walk like I didn't have finals coming up or papers to write. The only thing that was going through my head was "Wow it's been an hour already". The walk calmed my nerves and prepared me for my finals week and everything to get crazy. I wish I did this freshman year so I could have made it a habit before my final semester.
Read more

Haley Conroy - 2/14/23 - John Muir - (Outside of Class Reading)

  In the beginning section of John Muir’s essay titled Wild Parks and Reservations , he goes into depressing detail about noticeable changes in landscapes, particularly plant life, in many different regions of the United States. As I read this section I found myself thinking that it seems somewhat similar to something you would see in an essay on the environmental changes induced by climate change today. One connection between the text and modern-day was between ecotourism and the quote "Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wilderness is a necessity, and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers but as fountains of life." (721). Muir has taken the ideas of simplicity in life suggested by philosophers such as Thoreau and embodied them, although I think that Muir is a well-educated man that understood the complexities that exis...
Read more

Makenna Sowards—Free Response 3, Vegetarianism

 Dr. Kip speaking in class about renouncing vegetarianism because he considered it to boost him onto a moral high ground made me consider my own stance on vegetarianism. I haven't eaten meat in a year and a half, and my reasons for starting on this journey have remained as my reasons to continue. After learning about the detrimental impact of the meat-packing industry, I very quickly realized that was not something that I wanted to perpetuate by spending money on meat products. Though, it can very easily be argued that my small, personal movement against the food conglomerates responsible for releasing grotesque amounts of methane into the atmosphere as well as carbon emissions from large numbers of fossil-fueled machines does not make a very big impact, I think it serves another purpose: awareness. When people ask why I refuse to eat meat, it gives me the opportunity to speak on the carbon footprint of the meat-packing industry and how it is one of the largest contributors to dest...
Read more