A frequent topic of interest among students, especially incoming first-years, is food recommendations — as orientation leaders and members of the recruitment committees, we are constantly asked by incoming first-year students for restaurant and other business recommendations. However, we have noticed that Columbia students often prioritize going to restaurants in other parts of the city (specifically downtown Manhattan and Brooklyn). Thus, through this project, we hope to be able to ensure that more Columbia students’ dollars are being spent on minority and women-owned businesses (and particularly Black-owned businesses) local to the West Harlem community that Columbia is located within by advertising them on our dedicated Instagram page. We believe that this project is especially timely during a period when small businesses are feeling the negative impacts of COVID-19 and when many white and non-Black people are looking more critically at how they can use their spending power to support Black-owned businesses.

Team Members:

Tamarah Wallace, CC ‘22

Brandon Shi, CC ‘22