Tag: Muncie

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City-wide Preservation Plan for Muncie – Fall 2015

Muncie – like many Midwest industrial communities – is recovering from the recent recession and the resulting blight. According to research completed by Ball State’s historic preservation graduate students, the cities that are making the best recoveries are those with strategies that combine historic preservation and city planning to enact redevelopment efforts based on strategic demolitions, rehabilitations, targeted code enforcement and land banking. They have two major strategies in common: data collection and good preservation plans. Through this immersive learning project, Ball State students led by Faculty Mentor Susan Lankford, participated in ScoutMuncie, a data collection and historic resources survey initiated by Muncie’s Historic Preservation and Rehabilitation Commission. The students used this data, information gathered through a series of community meetings, and their own research to prepare a preservation plan that will guide the Commission’s efforts to preserve our history and use our historic resources to increase quality of life, strengthen our sense of place, and ensure our Sustainability.

Check out their video to learn more:

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The Many Faces of Muncie – Fall 2015

People make Muncie tick.  This city was built and continues to run because of complex, interesting, fascinating people.  This project celebrates the lives of everyday Muncie residents and their contributions to the economy, history, diversity and culture of this community, focusing on telling the stories of their lives and their professions.  By spending time with these people, the Ball State students and their Telecommunications Faculty Mentor, Suzy Smith, were able to shed light on what it takes to create a diverse, steadfast and strong-willed community.

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Muncie Meth Task Force Survey – Fall 2015

The Muncie Meth Task Force is a diverse group of individuals representing housing providers, the health and wellness fields, the city of Muncie, local foundations, and the neighborhoods that are working to find solutions to the issues related to Meth in the community. There are a variety of focus groups and interviews being conducted by consultants at Indiana Resource and Prevention Center out of Indiana University. This work is funded by a NeighborWorks grant to PathStone through which the City of Muncie (Community Development) is a partner.  The purpose of the grant is to complete an assessment of the Meth issue in our community and to establish an action plan to deal with Meth issues relevant to housing.  

In this project Melinda Messineo led a group of Ball State students in conjunction with the Muncie Meth Task Force, to gather information about the use of methamphetamines in Muncie and Delaware county, and the reasons behind the possible increase in usage rates. The data will be used to inform intervention programs that the Task Force will be creating over the next year. To gather the data, students communicated with local law enforcement as well as current and former users from the area.

If you would like more information about the Muncie Meth Taskforce, please contact Annette Phillips.

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Nature Play: Design Build Exploration with Children as Co-creators – Fall 2015

Pam Harwood, of the Ball State University Department of Architecture, led teams of students from various majors in this Immersive Learning project designed to combine learning and playtime for Muncie children.

“Our children are the first generation to be raised without meaningful contact with the natural world,” wrote Richard Louv. This project presented a variety of small-scale design-build opportunities for interdisciplinary teams of students to develop into innovative play elements for a nature-based outdoor learning environment at Head Start’s preschool in Muncie. An integration of design, making, teaching, and learning was paramount in this elective. Whether using salvaged timbers for a series of small bridges in the wetlands, or re-harvested wood in the knowledge wall, sustainable construction and environmental education was the goal of this nature-based preschool environment. Age-appropriate activity settings were co-created with children in a user-centered manner, where the approach to learning was gently guided, open-ended explorations in sensitively constructed learning spaces and natural habitats.

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Muncie-based Sociology Immersive Learning Projects – Fall 2015

Associate Professor and Chairperson of the Department of Sociology, Melinda Messineo, led several groups of Ball State students in sociological Immersive Learning projects around the city.  Organizations partnered included the United Way of Muncie and Delaware County, Edible Muncie, and the Muncie Redevelopment Commission.  In these projects, students worked with their community partners to gather information about literacy opportunities in build spaces (United Way) food scarcity and pantry use (Edible Muncie) and residential decision making processes for young professionals (Muncie redevelopment).  The data will be used to inform programs for each of the partners over the next year.