Barrio Logan Case

I am interning at Barrio Logan College institute (BLCI). BLCI is a non-profit organization whose mission to help children from the community who are predominantly Latinos, to become the first in their families to attend college. They serve students starting in 3rd grade through graduating high school seniors. BLCI provides academic assistance such as tutoring, college preparatory classes and one-one-one counseling. Additionally, BLCI also believes that helping the parents of their students is important; therefore in 2011 the parent program was instated with the goal of encouraging parents to become more involved in their children’s education. As an alumnus of BLCI, I decided that my internship would be a great opportunity for me to help parents
The topic for my 15 page essay will be on the environmental challenges affecting poor and minority communities, specifically with a case study about Barrio Logan. The ISCOR theme I will be focusing on is environmental justice. “Environmental justice is a grassroots movement that deals with environmental burdens and their distributional consequences.” (Visgilio and Whitelaw) Through my studies, I have learned that the majority of the front men and women of the environmental justice movement are predominantly, indigenous groups, Latinos and African American. Although race and ethnicity are an important factor, in this 15 page essay I will be focusing on how social class also plays a big role in who will be sustaining the unequal share of our society’s environmental consequences. Compared to middle and higher class neighborhoods, poor and disadvantaged communities tend to lack political and economic leverage. The reason for minimal involvement is due to cultural migrant experiences, including fear of deportation since the majority of the community is undocumented, also known as illegal immigration status. Thus, not only is representation and advocacy for community services and resources is diminished,
It’s mainly been difficult because the chemical and naval corporations in the vicinity are unwilling to negotiate with the community to redevelop, forcing this community to be physically pinned down. Also, unfortunately local government hasn’t been helpful either. Therefore, my prospective on how the community is addressing these issues has changed, and how I see gentrification issues of the community. Lastly, due to these external factors, families rather work on and combat other tangible social justice issues, such as immigration, food insecurity and healthcare mainly because they can directly see the results of their