Bart Eddy is an educator, entrepreneur and community development advocate who has worked in Detroit for more than 35 years. During that time he has Co-Founded the Barnabas Youth Opportunities Center (1983), Detroit Community Schools (1997) and the Sunbridge International Collaborative (2012). He currently directs the “Brightmoor Makers” program for youth employment and advocacy and is passionately committed to helping young people find their sense of vision, mission and purpose in the global community. Bart was a class teacher at the Detroit Waldorf School from 1988-1996.

The Brightmoor Makers and Sunbridge International Collaborative have been engaged in youth employment ~ community transformation since the summer of 2009 by working with young people from Detroit Community High School, the community at large and University of Michigan students in year round, hands on, experiential learning initiatives. We currently operate programs in construction, woodworking, bike/industrial trike mechanics, gardening/landscape and screen-printing. Our partners are neighborhood block clubs, community organizations and the University of Michigan Stamps School of Art and Design with whom we operate the Brightmoor Maker Space. Right Livelihood through community wellbeing and sustainable economics is an on-going focus of our work, and we have incorporated “healing through the sheathes” as an aspect of the Developmental Pathway of Work which seeks to awaken the inherent gifts that live in all of us and transform traumatized neighborhoods. With Covid-19 and the issues surrounding racial injustices, we are turning our attention to outdoor classrooms in the community to reimagine what the “School of the Future” might look like.