If you walked by a street and you was walking on the concrete and

you saw a rose growing from the concrete, even if it had messed up
petals and it was a little to the side you would marvel at just seeing a
rose grow through concrete. This quotes by Tupac Shakur accurately
describes my journey through this semester working on the
Washington Heights Oral History Project. I feel that, like a rose through
concrete, I was able to push through any obstacles this semester in
order to grow as a person as well as a member of the community.
Although the end result may not have been perfect, I feel that our hard
work and dedication to this project and the beauty of its impact on
society is still something worth marveling over.
The beginning of the semester was like planting the seed; teaching us
the definition of citizenship and service and its purpose within a
community. When asked to write what I believe citizenship is, I initially
believed that the responsibilities of being a citizen only consisted of
duties related to being respectable to others, paying taxes, selective
service (for males), obeying laws, jury duty, etc. After reading the U.S.
Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) description of the rights
and responsibilities of citizenship, I realized that, as a citizen within the
United States, it is our responsibility to be an active member of the
community, which includes staying informed and completing
community service. Personally, I feel that most people, including
myself, would initially view these as rights rather than responsibilities.
However, although these responsibilities are often overlooked in
society, I do feel that they are very crucial aspects of being a citizen.
By staying informed and participating in the local community, people
are able to stay active within their community as well as providing aid
whenever possible. This, in turn, would further help maintain common
problems within communities such as poverty and homelessness.
Like a majority of other students in school, reading is my kryptonite.
However, I enjoyed reading the assigned essays and texts focused on
citizenship. The readings gave me allowed me to compare and contrast
various opinions of citizenship in order to develop my own
understanding of the concept. Before reading the two essays by
Charles Murray and Barbara Ehrenreich, I defined poverty as someone
who has little to no money who cant afford to buy the basic
necessities required to live. However, after reading Murrays essay, I
realized that money is not an important condition to consider when
talking about poverty. In fact, poverty is more based on whether or not
you are living at a subsistence or sub-subsistence level. This, in tern,
means having enough food to be adequately nourished, plus the most
basic shelter and clothing.

My favorite activity of the semester was the wheel of life exercise that
we completed in class. For this assignment, we were asked to rank the
ten aspects of life discussed in class. Reflecting on the ten aspects of
life discussed in class, I ranked them in order of importance (from most
to least important): Family, Spirituality, Health, Relationships, Personal
Growth, Education, Work, Money, Citizenship, and Play. What I liked
most about this exercise is that I was able to sit and think about what I
value as a person. Also, I found it very interesting to hear other
classmates lists and what is important to them. In some cases, there
were similar lists to mineslightly varyinghowever, there were also
lists that were completely different than mine. It was very insightful
comparing and contrasting the reasons I ranked their importance
versus other students in the class. I feel that this knowledge will allow
me to keep in mind that everyone has different values and aspects that
must be considered when interacting with other citizens. What I really
found interesting is how these values have reflected on my thought
process and actions on a daily basis in addition to the type of
community service I participate in. Due to my focus on relationships
and family, the types of community service I have done in the past
have been geared toward direct contact with the people in need. For
example, I remember volunteering with Crisis Assistance Ministry
where we prepared meals, made beds, and socialized with the
homeless. Personally, I feel more accomplished when I can actually see
the difference my service provides.
After completing the readings and assignments and learning the
general information of what it means to be a citizen, we were finally
allowed to sprout from the crack of the concrete and begin working on
the project. For the Washington Heights Oral History Project, we were
split into four groups with tasks that had to be completed by the end of
the semester. The groups that were created were the interview group,
documentary group, website group, and the final event group. With my
experience in video editing and creation, I chose to be a part of the
documentary group. In all honesty, I chose this group in hopes of it
being easier than the tasks of the other groups. Sadly, this was the not
how it turned out, however, I do not regret my decision to be a part of
this group.
The documentary group members included Cody Ledbetter, Hunter
Starr, as well as myself. Our group would meet at various times
throughout the semester in order to slowly peace together the final
documentary. We began initially by creating an general outline for what
we would include in the documentary. Then, we created a detailed
outline for the documentary, which allowed us to began working on a
script for the documentary. Cody and Hunter completed most of the
script, while I began making the introduction of the documentary. After

meeting as a group to finalize the script and recording the voice-over, I

compiled all of the pictures, videos, quotes, and interviews into the
final documentary. Although I initially joined the group thinking it would
be easy, Im glad I did choose this group due to the fact that I had a lot
of fun working on the documentary. Overall, I enjoyed working with
them and I am satisfied with our final result.