Monday, December 2, 2024
Urban Planning

Quarter 2, We Hardly Knew Ye: Up Next at Handbuilt

A minor housekeeping update. First, I owe my readership an apology. After several consecutive months of record-breaking traffic, I had to slow things down a bit to try and finish this damn degree. For those who were unaware, I started an MBA program at American University’s Kogod School of Business last year. I have a love-hate relationship with it. Anyway, I’m pleased to report that I managed to pull out a GPA of 3.67, which works out to an A average (barely). It was a slog. I aced my accounting final with a 96%, which shocked me, and I comparatively bombed on my law final, which also shocked me, given that I thought I was way better in that class. Still did OK.

This quarter plus COVID has sort of challenged me to think more critically about what kind of material I’m trying to produce as we all had to take a break from physically going places. This became even more complicated during the police brutality protests of late, which I covered for TheHUB and wrote about here, too. I didn’t start a blog to write about police brutality. I started it to tell stories about the things that make cities great. Specifically, I started it to try and demystify the complicated processes that make things happen in cities and communities, looking especially at disinvested communities and things like wealth disparity. But I can’t not cover the police issue, because policing has had such a profound, damaging effect on many communities. So, more on this to come, plus some ideas on where we can go from here as we face down the specters of not only the future of policing but also the future of cities in COVID-borne financial ruin.

In other news, I also enlisted a few new contributors. I also lost a few Patreon and Liberapay contributors, which was a bummer (but not super surprising as the economy falls apart). While I try to keep my GPA above 3.0, I will keep producing content. I will also keep telling stories that I think need to be told. Stay tuned!

Nat Zorach

Nat M. Zorach, AICP is a city planner, community development professional, and MBA candidate at American University's Kogod School of Business, based in Detroit.

Leave a Reply