Innovative Entprepreneurs
How do you reinvigorate the economy of a rust belt city?  Our guests on this week's show are working both at the grass roots and civic levels to rebuild the economies of their mid-sized cities.
Ron Kitchens is the CEO of Southwest Michigan First, a nonprofit organization dedicated to being a catalyst for success in Kalamazoo, Michigan.  Ron joins us to tell us about incubating new companies in this economy and how smaller businesses can thrive when large corporations fail.

Eric Mathews is the founder of Launch Memphis, an organization that nurtures technology startups in Memphis.  We'll talk to Eric about how technology can help seed an entrepreneurial community and be used to bring entrepreneurs together.

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The Trouble with Black Boys

This week on Smart City, we explore the stubborn link between race and poverty in America. My guest, professor Pedro Noguera, has written a book about the cultural, societal and personal factors that cause young black and Hispanic males to run afoul of middle-class American norms. Professor Noguera joins us to discuss his book "The Trouble With Black Boys: And Other Reflections on Race, Equity, and the Future of Public Education ."


And we'll have a discussion with Thomas Sevcik about how much work it can take to change the way the world views a city. Thomas is the founder of the internationally acclaimed creative studio Arthesia and he'll tell us about the complicated issue of a city's identity and how to find what he calls "the city's drama."

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