Thread by @UR_Ninja

#NEW: A pastor is leading the charge of reclaiming an abandoned school and creating a community-and-trades center on the east side of Indianapolis.

Evolve Education Center: Abandoned Indianapolis School Reclaimed >> unicornriot.ninja/2021/evolve-ed… <<

Pastor Denell Howard’s vision of The Evolve Education Center is slowly coming to fruition after years of planning, praying & a community effort to fix the building up. The center needs the broader community to generate enough resources together to open. unicornriot.ninja/2021/evolve-ed…

A volunteer named Stan, who spent months cleaning up an abandoned school, gave Unicorn Riot a tour of the reclaimed building in July 2021. We heard from Stan & Pastor Howard about their vision for the Evolve Center & the work they’ve done up to that point.

With 40,000 square ft & dozens of rooms, The Evolve Center is slated to be a technologically advanced facility w/ office space, conference rooms, a beauty/barbershop, a podcast room, music production space, youth center, senior space, HVAC & trades room, & a day care room. 🧵

85% of the planned rooms came directly from community input. After starting to work on the building in the past year, Pastor Howard and volunteers created a campaign called Dare 2 Dream and “went door-to-door asking the community what they would like to see in the building.” 🧵

While the Evolve Center started with Pastor Howard's vision, a majority of the rooms planned were done so utilizing the community's ideas. Pastor said the trade room and Confidence Meals Kitchen were specifically from speaking with the residents of #Indianapolis. 🧵

Formerly an elementary school, Edgar Evans Indianapolis Public School 11 has been closed for nearly a decade and abandoned for several years. Pastor Howard said the building peeked his interest as he drove down 42nd Street to Millersville Road a few years back. 🧵

Pastor Howard “pulled over, got out, walked on the parking lot and prayed for it.” He did the same thing every time he drove by the abandoned school — he would get out, walk through the grass & facility, pray over the grounds & ask God for it. 🧵

Story: unicornriot.ninja/2021/evolve-ed…

One of his stops, Pastor Howard ran into the building manager who was boarding up windows & doors & asked him, “What’re you doing with my building?” He said after several conversations with the company that owns the building, he’s had control of it since around January 2021. 🧵

Committed to the community, Pastor Howard & his wife Keisha run E.V.O.L.V.E. Group (Educating for Victory Offering Leadership Vision & Empowerment), which holds the key, name & motive behind The Evolve Education Center, empowering the community w/ education, leadership, & vision.

Pastor Howard is more than just EVOLVE, he’s been mentoring Indianapolis youth from the streets to gymnasiums for many years. His church is also a focal point of community resourcefulness with youth programming, workshops, trainings, and mental health events among others.🧵

“We’re pushing really hard … I don’t want to be here in 2023 still taking videos and doing interviews.”

Pastor Denell Howard said he’s had great help from people like Stan (pictured) to start the process of making The Evolve Education Center a reality.

Stan said the Evolve Center is gonna be “for the people, by the people.” He's been working on cleaning up the building since Nov 2020. Squatters were living in it & the damage was widespread. The bulk of the clean up took 2.5 months & he was accompanied by Pastor & another 🧵

While giving a tour, Stan beamed with excitement at what could come to reality with the Evolve Center. While going through each room’s desired intentional purpose, he spoke about the cleanup work they’d done taking out the heating registers, ceiling tiles, chalkboards & more. 🧵

One of the many rooms in the Evolve Center that Stan was most excited about was the trades room for welders, pipe fitters, HVAC & construction workers. That room has a built-in ventilation system & they have an idea to create a large opening that would lead to outside stations.🧵

Stan said he likes trades: “Some people make like $23 an hour or $25 an hour, they make way more than what the folks with degrees make. So, going into a trade, I feel like, is way better than going to college depending on what you want to go for, but the skills never leaves you.”

Along with the program ‘From the Dirt to Your Plate,’ where you eat what you grow, Stan also spoke about plans for an outdoor courtyard for the elderly and building an aquaponics ecosystem for the kids with water, fish and plants [pictured].

The resources provided by the Evolve Center are endless, said Stan. They’re continuing the work of fixing up the building while trying to raise at least $1.2 million to get the center open, knowing it will likely cost a few million for all the plans to come to fruition. 🧵

The Education Evolve Center is accepting donations online through the Hovey St. Church of Christ. Pastor Howard said “every dime we get is used to push the little things forward.” givelify.com/donate/hovey-s…

Full story and video from the above thread available here: unicornriot.ninja/2021/evolve-ed…