WiP Assignment 5: Reflection

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This wicked problem has made me realize just how deep the issue of food security goes. Many people don’t actually know what food security even means. At first, we thought it would be just a matter of making food more affordable, but then after we started researching, it became a lot more intricate than we had initially expected. You have the issue of gentrification, which moves low-income people to places in which they lack access to full-service grocery stores, resulting in them having to shop at much more expensive corner stores because of how close they are. For something smaller and so much less than a grocery store, people end up paying so much more, and people usually don’t even realize just how expensive convenience stores are in the first place. So not only are people not given access to good, healthful grocery stores but because the stores are so far away they need proper transportation to get to said stores. The thing is, these people already live in low-income areas, and most likely cannot afford a car. Even if people do have jobs, they are most likely low-paying, manual labor-type jobs because many people end up dropping out of school so that they could help support their family. It’s a never-ending cycle in that families lack food, they need food, to get food they need transportation, transportation is too expensive, they need work to support family in hopes of getting food and transportation, the work is low-paying, the food and transportation and basic needs of these families are often never met. If transportation was provided to these areas, it would help so much by finally catering just to THEM and finally allowing them to properly support themselves and their families like everyone else. I feel like a lot of the issues go unseen; people have a vague idea of what is going on, but never really know the extent to which it happens. If people were educated about this issue as well, I think that it could provide much needed change and help.

WiP Project Assignment 4: Group Brainstorming:

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The above is work I did after the meeting last week where we discussed and brainstormed our wicked problem. When we all got together, lots of our interviewees did not get back with us, but luckily we were able to discuss some interviews last Monday. When we were talking about the interviews, one of the recurring themes was that of how food security and transportation are intricately linked. The majority of the food problems we are looking at (and the interviews we got) result as a consequence of a lack of transportation. For example, Meals on Wheels delivers to those who cannot go out and get their own food- they transport the food to especially marginalized people who cannot do it themselves. And we were discussing how a lot of people actually can’t go out for groceries, and weighing the consequences and benefits of having something like a shuttle service to go back and forth between the stores and residential areas… but then if the store were to pay for that then the store would lose money, and regardless of who pays for it, the idea is expensive and we realized, kind of impractical (it’s literally like a bus… the question of HOW the groceries would fit or HOW they would be able to carry them to their houses came up too). One of the most interesting points that came up was from an interview with an H-E-B cashier. He said that it was always very difficult to see, a mother for example, and her child on food stamps, come up to the register and have to put back some items because they do not have enough stamps, or because the items were not supported by food stamps. He said something about how the mother would try as hard as she could to keep it secret from the child because she didn’t want the child to worry or get upset because they couldn’t afford it. That was a very sad detail, and now that I think about it, it happens a lot, whether or not the customers are on food stamps. We still believe that the main points in our wicked problem are transportation, and how people can get access to food.

WiP Project Assignment 3: Reflection

 

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I knew beforehand that my grandpa always hated going to stores and going out and about. When my grandma was here, it was hard to get her around because of her wheelchair, and it a lot of work for him to get her places. Whenever they went anywhere, it took twice as long because of the complications my grandma experienced, and going out was very hard for both of them. My grandpa also really doesn’t like big crowds; they overwhelm him and make him anxious. So driving, of course, made him very anxious, especially given the fact that Austin is so big, and the streets are very crowded and pretty scary at times. Meals on Wheels lifted a weight off his shoulders; he could still get food for himself and my grandma without having to stress out about it. He talked about how the program really relies on volunteers, and how programs like these all really rely on the generosity of others.

He’s been really really appreciative of Meals on Wheels not only for what he describes as “excellent food service,” but also because of a little known program called PALS, which offers pet care and services to Meals on Wheels customers. My grandpa lives alone with his dog, and she means the world to him. When she started to have health problems, people from PALS would take her to the vet and groomers. This program isn’t related to food service, but it goes hand in hand with how many programs often have different services.

One of the main themes my group has noticed regarding food security is that transportation plays a really big role. If people rely on public transportation, for instance, they won’t really be able to go to the grocery store, get whatever they want, and lug all of their bags onto the bus; its too much for them to carry and doing that has a lot of risk. Also, marginalized groups like the disabled or elderly often lack transportation, so we were wondering how people in Austin could get better transportation to increase their chances of being able to get easy access to food.

Photography Reflection

Folks, Dr. Kennedy came and talked to you about Photography on Monday. For this weeks blog, please reflect on his lecture and comments regarding the nature of photography. How is photography a wicked problem to Dr Kennedy? What surprised, shocked, interested, or scandalized you from his presentation? 

Photography can act as a wicked problem in multiple ways. First, photography can capture a wicked problem in action; it can describe a problem without even having to use words. Second, photography can act as a wicked problem in its honesty and authenticity, because photographs can easily be altered. To Dr. Kennedy, I’m sure one of the wicked problems he faces everyday is regarding the purpose of a photo; a photo can be expressive and artsy, and it can also be a tool for documentation and investigation. Can a photograph fit into both of these categories?

From the presentation, I was fascinated by how Dr. Kennedy was able to make his photographs look so different when he altered them in photoshop. Something that looked like an abstract painting was actually a legitimate photograph, and the colors and everything about it were based off of the actual photo. It was cool to see how abstract, colorful, and different the photographs could be when altered in photoshop, and how something as simple as a color or exposure change could change the entire feel of the photo.

Visual Representation & Reflection- Food Security

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In this visual, I tried to piece together the different components of the food security system, and to connect them to each other and bring in different relationships between them. There are dour main parts of this system: Producers (those who make the food), Manufacturers (those who sell the food), Consumers (those who eat the food), and Corporations (those who own the food and get the most profit.) Although the producers work tirelessly to get the food in the condition its in, they often don’t get nearly as much money as they should for their product Their share is very small, a fraction of a fraction compared to what corporations get. As an example, take the coffee farmers in Columbia. Their beans and farms are owned by Starbucks, even though Starbucks is hardly helping them. As a result, the farmers barely get any profit for their incredibly laborious work, while Starbucks, being the huge company, gets nearly all of the profit. We talked about how there’s a gap in which many consumers cannot afford to get food, whether it be because of transportation issues or money issues. Because of this gap, food banks and programs such as SNAP help them in getting food. However, the help stops there for the most part. My group was bringing up an idea in which these programs would be able to help low-income people in the long run get food on their own, without heavy reliance. They could hold workshops on interview etiquette, resume building, etc. that would help these people get jobs and get money of their own. One of the final problems I noted was that unhealthy food is often much cheaper than healthy. Maybe its because the franchises that sell these unhealthy foods can get more profit; its cheaper so much more Americans are buying it. If healthy foods were cheaper, the producers could get more money, the population would be healthier, and medical issues such as obesity and diabetes would be down.

Week 4 Reflection

My linked course for this LLC is unintuitive maths. One of the ways I could offer connections and new ideas to this project is through trying a different way of thinking or looking at a particular problem. This class takes a (math) problem that might seem so simple, and we talk about so many different ways to approach the problem and we realize just how many solutions a problem can have. We don’t focus on the correct answer (yet) but one of the main things I’ve picked up from that class is being able to understand and support my findings logically, even if they are wrong. Because even if they’re incorrect, my interpretation and the process I used to formulate an answer still matter, because every mind runs in a different way. Everyone has different ways of seeing things. My group has chosen a focus on food security, and I feel like I can especially view things from a different perspective and think of possible reasons things are the way they are. I can focus on how different factors influence certain outcomes, and how each outcome comes from a certain “background”; that outcome was formulated for a reason. I could be the link that thinks logically and systematically in this problem, thinking of and interpreting every possible outcome or influence that has, or could occur.

Austin CAN Presentation 9/12/16

a. What was the most interesting element of the presentation by Mr. Alvarez today? 

The element I found the most interesting was the fact that although the unemployment rate is decreasing, 69% of jobs created from 2005-2015 do not pay enough to support a family of one adult and two children. This doesn’t even include bigger families, such as families with two parents or multiple kids. The fact that these jobs aren’t helping these families is incredibly distressing, especially given the fact that this statistic isn’t inclusive of bigger families.

b. How did you feel after hearing this presentation. Were you surprised, uncomfortable, happy, excited by the data and ideas that were shared?

After the presentation, I felt a bit uncomfortable, or rather, disturbed simply because a lot of the gaps in percentages or outliers are happening to minorities. The socio-economic gap is significantly larger for minorities, and I wonder why that is. The disproportionality is astounding…

c. Why is it important to explore wicked problems locally? How does this help us learn more about ourselves and our world? 

This is important because by starting to fix a problem (or at least observe it and know about it) in a smaller community, it allows us to look at things in a smaller lens; we can see the intricacies within the community and different factors that play into why certain differences occur. By exploring wicked problems locally, we can learn about solutions to these problems and by extension, more about both our community and the world and how these problems shape society.

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