ASU's downtown Phoenix campus is woven between the art and business districts of Phoenix and is just steps away from the light rail system, which is a major connection for the Arizona community. (Photo by Jessie Wardarski)Since the Downtown campus opened four years ago, almost 90 campus community outreach groups have formed to link students with the surrounding Phoenix community.
ASU Downtown Alive! is one of the 88 campus community outreach organizations. The group’s founder, journalism senior Vaughn Hillyard, said he noticed students tended to remain in the boundaries of the Downtown campus during his freshman year.
“There was an extreme lack of connection with local business eateries, shops and entertainment,” Hillyard said. “There was a lack of communication between ASU Downtown campus and community members.”
Although Hillyard’s efforts to get students more involved have been successful, he admits more work is needed to integrate students into the downtown Phoenix neighborhood.
The Downtown Phoenix Partnership, an organization that helps acclimate visitors to downtown Phoenix, has seen a change from student involvement.
CEO David Roderique noticed more student integration into the community since the campus’s debut.
“When the campus first opened … there wasn’t that much,” Roderique said. “The kids kind of all stayed on campus and didn’t want to go out.”
He said the Downtown Phoenix Partnership has been able to get involved with different schools, such as the nursing school.
“We have done things like health fairs, where people can get their blood pressure checked,” Roderique said.
The Downtown Phoenix Partnership tries to communicate what’s going on in Phoenix through different programs within the Downtown campus, Roderique said.
“We advertise and try to get the word out through things like the Urban Devil app,” he said. “ASU has been a great partner for us, it has made a tremendous impact downtown and we couldn’t be happier.”
Like community organizations such as Downtown Phoenix Partnership, students have made an effort to get their peers acquainted with Phoenix.
Mary Cook, director of student success at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, said that because Phoenix is different compared to Tempe, the campus has found a different way of getting involved with the community.
“We have our own unique spin to involvement with the community,” Cook said.
Cook herself helps students volunteer within the community.
She said sometimes student efforts go unseen by the community.
“I don’t think that the community itself is always aware of what ASU Downtown campus is doing in terms of giving back to the community,” Cook said. “Maybe we need to look at trying to get that message out to our community members.”
Reach the reporter at shurst2@asu.edu
