Talent - from potential to kinetic energy

Albert Cruz's time lapse photo of Philadelphia City Hall

We insist our students spend time assembling asset maps before they come up with strategies during their crime prevention work. We call it tapping into the latent neighborhood talent.

That talent staggers the mind. It represents an untapped source of potential energy waiting to be transformed into its kinetic form, what social scientists call community efficacy. Read the social science description of this effect in Robert Sampson's epic Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect.

Roberto Contreras' photo from surrounding mountains overlooking Santiago, Chile

For firsthand evidence check out these fabulous cityscape photos taken by talented photographers - students participating in, or connected with, SafeGrowth trainings over the past few years.

John Thurston and Roberto Contreras kindly provided birds eye views of their respective cities in past SafeGrowth trainings. The latest offering is at the top of this blog; a beautiful time lapse portrait of City Hall by Philadelphia police officer Albert Cruz.

Photograher John Thurston from San Diego took this photo of City Heights