My name is Luke Clister, and I am an English Writing major completing the fourth year of my undergraduate degree. Pitt is actually the third school I have attended while attaining my degree! Previously, I attended Indiana University of Pennsylvania and PennWest California before finishing my two years here at Pitt. At Pitt, I’m part of the Pitt News and WPTS Radio, alongside my student job in the mailroom.

I am overjoyed to leave my imprint on the long-lasting relationship Pitt has built with the ACRI and Fayette County community over the last five years, through professors and past students. A mission built not just on real-world education, but on an opportunity to promote and enact real change in Fayette County through economic development research, not just in the classroom but physically in the community

Any project is as important as the effort you put into it, and I believe this project requires the care and determination to make a truly meaningful impact. From reviewing past years of other students’ project missions and work, I know we can make a real difference with this project.  This year’s class carries a legacy of responsibility to keep the project’s momentum going. 

The research is particularly crucial to me as someone born and raised in the community this project is intended to help. I am well aware of my community’s shortcomings and struggles that can drive a young adult to the city, so when this project presented itself, I initially hoped to understand what my community needed.

I joined this project because I wanted to be able to contribute to presenting solutions for my community on what it could do to better aid itself. Knowing how few students remotely attend university, especially at Pitt in Fayette County, made me feel responsible for joining this project. Not because I had all the answers, but because I knew my voice and my history. Working with other students and faculty who may not share my history yet are here for a goal to better the community is something I needed to be part of. 

What is apparent to all projects, but especially in ours, is the many differences in shared histories and, most importantly, perspectives. I am positive this will, however, make our project stronger and build key skills in all of us for working together. Our collaboration requires crucial transferable skills such as communication and even empathy. Throughout my academic career and with most of my colleagues, I learned skills such as communication in classes; however, I did so with a lower-stakes responsibility that was only for ourselves through grades. This project is different: it affects not only me but also the community and our university; it offers real-world experience that challenges my skills and helps me grow.

As someone who questions their future professional goals and career path whether to pursue journalistic writing or law one thing is for certain: anyone can benefit from the project’s required and implemented skills. Perhaps, when I look inward to my own community in this project, I may have more of a clarity about a future I can pursue and be proud of.