By Dana Davidson, Co-Executive Director of SAY Play In late May of 2020 the leadership of SAY Detroit Play Center decided to host a summer camp.  This camp would open during the first global pandemic since 1918.  It would open as the United States struggled to get a handle on a virus that most developed Continue Reading

In May, Dow and WE, international development charity and youth empowerment movement, announced the winners of the WE Are Innovators Challenge for the 2018-2019 school year. Twenty-eight student winners and their teachers were awarded the opportunity to go on a culturally immersive ME to WE service-learning trip to Kenya. Among them is Tionna Thompson, the Continue Reading

SAY Play hosted the 1st Annual Lipke Park Reunion on Saturday, July 20. It was an opportunity for members of the Osborn / Pershing neighborhood, old and new, to come together to celebrate the Lipke Recreation Center’s history as a community touchstone. Before it fell into disarray after budget cuts and theft, the 14-acre facility Continue Reading

Nearly 100 Detroit youth football players, ages eight to 13, were out on Stafford Field on Saturday, July 20th at the Xenith Prep Kickoff Classic Youth Clinic. Presented in partnership with the Detroit Sports Commission, Xenith, and SAY Play, the youth clinic was a community initiative of the 15th annual Xenith Prep Kickoff Classic taking Continue Reading

On Saturday, July 13, our SAY Detroit Warriors took part in the inaugural Detroit Pistons 3-on-3 Tournament at Little Caesars Arena. Check out the photos from their day:  

Tionna Thompson, a 15-year-old SAY Play member born in Nebraska but raised in Detroit, was asked to meet with Co-Executive Director Dana Davidson in the small staff conference room at the center. Her friends were asked to join her. Waiting for her on the other end of a FaceTime call was Meredith Morris, Global Education Continue Reading

Dr. Kalisha McLendon, DDS, treated our students to a special presentation about dental health. A practicing dentist in Detroit and graduate of  the University of Michigan and the University of Maryland – Baltimore, Dr. McLendon discussed her path to dentistry from Detroit public schools to a University of Michigan residency. Her presentative include an interactive Continue Reading

Position Profile Executive Director of the SAY Detroit Play Center The SAY Detroit Play Center is a premier training center for young people in Detroit to improve their community, starting with themselves. Located on 14 acres at Lipke Park on the northeast side of Detroit, the Play Center is the brainchild of best-selling author Mitch Continue Reading

Please join us in congratulation Davion Jackson, 17, who is the recipient of theErnest Lofton Junior Goodfellow of the Year Award, presented by the Detroit Goodfellows at this morning’s 29th Annual Tribute Breakfast. Held at the Cobo Center, the event honored City of Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan with the Edward H. McNamara Goodfellow of the Year Award Continue Reading