Andre Mika, executive director of the new Baton Rouge Shaw Center for the Arts, spoke to students yesterday about Baton Rouge’s problems and how they can help solve them.
Mika spoke as part of the lecture series, “Louisiana Leaders: Building our Future.”
Mika said Baton Rouge residents often leave because of the city’s problems, which he said includes rising rates of poverty, crime and teen pregnancy.
Some people will take less money and a different job just to get out of Baton Rouge, Mika said.
“We address issues in Louisiana in very strange ways,” Mika said. “We should ask ourselves: Is this a problem or an opportunity?”
Mika used the Shaw Center as an example of seeing an opportunity instead of a problem. He said there used to be a severe lack of art and culture in downtown Baton Rouge.
Downtown should be the center of a city, and residents and businesses have moved out of the area because it is not, Mika said.
But the Shaw Center is part of a new change, Mika said.
“Now, we have a cultural renaissance in Baton Rouge,” he added.
The growing art and culture of downtown will give people a reason to go there again, Mika said.
The $50 million Shaw Center for the Arts opened earlier this month, and Mika promised that it will change the way Baton Rouge residents interact with the arts.
The facility has multiple floors that hold theaters, galleries, the LSU Museum of Art and a new sushi restaurant called Tsunami.
Mika asked his listeners a question: How can a person affect the quality of life in Baton Rouge?
He said students have to get involved and “make things happen.”
“Voice your opinion and take back your government,” Mika said. “Hold [elected officials] responsible.”
Mika said Baton Rouge residents should strive to do what they love for the benefit of others.
“Today’s economy is all about finding a better way to do something,” Mika said. “I am in Baton Rouge because I can help people think and feel differently about the world.”
Mika said the public school system is one of Baton Rouge’s major problems.
“We must take responsibility for our public schools,” Mika said.
A better education system would fix a number of Louisiana’s other problems, Mika said.
Mika, a Baton Rouge native who attended public schools here throughout his childhood and adolescence, said the schools were disrupted when they were desegregated.
“Desegregation really threw the school system upside down,” Mika said. “They have never really recovered from that.”
Mika also expressed concern about Baton Rouge’s health care system.
“The health care in Baton Rouge is in an uproar right now,” Mika said, though he admitted he is not sure how to solve that problem.
Though attendance at Mika’s lecture was sparse, students who attended said they were pleased with what he had to say.
“It was not what I expected,” said Jane Serbin, a business freshman. “I really liked his perspective on things.”
Cindy Seghers, a coordinator with Career Services, invited Mika to participate in the lecture series.
“We thought he would be very interesting for students,” Seghers said. “And we thought the timing was perfect because the Shaw Center just opened.”