Somber Images from Detroit’s Abandoned Schools

Vice Magazine writer and photographer James Griffioen has posted the first part of a series of articles on his visits inside abandon schools in Detroit.

With an aging infrastructure built for twice the existing population, the school district has to shut down and vacate school buildings every year. In 2008, I went into several schools closed the previous year to find buildings stripped of metal but left with libraries full of books, computer labs upturned, art classrooms full of supplies, and administration offices filled with confidential and sensitive student records.

James describes that people that have seen his photographs tend to have a strong reaction to the piles of books and derelict classrooms and tend to project more sympathy towards those things than the children that won’t have the chance to use them. He sees these schools as a manifestation of bureaucratic waste and poor management that provide children with no hope. While we’ve previously looked at some really amazing schools around the world, these photographs are a reminder that there is still a lot of work that could be done to better conditions for learning.

[via spaceinvading]