Wednesday, April 12, 2017 // The Statement
7B
“I had a meeting with Dan Gilbert the
second day (of my internship) — I think we
were talking about one of his developments —
and he calls me out and says, ‘You’re the girl
whose family owns Dutch Girl!’ And I was
like, ‘Yes, sir, that’s me.’ And he stole my note-
book and he stole my pen and started making
a map, and he was like, ‘This is your doughnut
shop, this is where my dad’s bar was and we
used to go over there all the time!’ He called
me Doughnut Girl all summer.”
Though she may be “Doughnut Girl” to
Detroit billionaire and philanthropist Dan
Gilbert, most people know the Ross School of
Business sophomore as Arrie Timmer — an
enthusiastic and entrepreneurial spirit who
is looking to do big things in and for the city
of Detroit.
As Gilbert noted, Timmer’s family owns
Dutch Girl Donuts, a Detroit doughnut staple.
Her grandparents opened the shop when they
moved here in 1946, and it’s been in the fam-
ily ever since. As Timmer grew up, Dutch Girl
shaped her childhood.
“On Fridays, my dad would have me go
with him downtown to the store and work
until midnight, and then I would sleep in
the back room,” she said. “I had a sleeping
bag and I would sleep on top of flour sacks.
It wasn’t anything special — I was 10 and it
was just cleaning — but it was cool to have a
job, and have responsibilities.”
Timmer also credits the shop with bring-
ing her closer to the city. Many of Dutch
Girl’s employees have worked there since
before she was born, and growing up with
them allowed her to see the city through
their eyes.
It was a love for her family business and
for Detroit that brought Timmer to the Busi-
ness School. She’s seen the good that busi-
ness can do, and is determined to use it as a
way to change people’s lives for the better.
“Growing up with entrepreneurs as fam-
ily members, it gave me a lot of respect for
business, and the ways they can be used to
support communities and drive change and
growth in cities,” she said. “I’ve seen how
our family business, even though it’s small,
has changed other people’s lives.”
And, of course, because entrepreneurship
seems to flow through Timmer’s veins, she
is helping to grow and start several projects
at Michigan that aren’t directly related to
Detroit, too. As a survivor of sexual assault,
she helped to expand the Panhellenic Peer
Education Program last year, which teaches
girls in Greek life about issues of sexual vio-
lence and fosters a community of support
among them. She also is working to start a
magazine with her friends next fall that will
publish the writing and artwork of college-
aged women.
“I was just tired of having old men say,
‘Your work is not good enough to be pub-
lished,’ ” she said.
Between her school work and extracur-
ricular projects and helping out at Dutch
Girl — the whole family still goes back to
work Fat Tuesday every year — Timmer
found time last summer to put her passions
to work as an intern for Rock Ventures, Dan
Gilbert’s Detroit-based firm that is helping
to revitalize the city in enormous ways.
Though some people criticize the way Gil-
bert is working in the city, Timmer sings his
praises.
“He’s very passionate about what he does
and he’s very passionate about making a dif-
ference. People think of him as this monarch
who’s taking over the city and isn’t doing it
mindfully, but he has teams and teams of
people who make sure that his work is mind-
ful of the city’s existing residents and mind-
ful of what will bring people into the city.”
As an intern, she worked on projects such
as Rehabbed and Ready, which works in
partnership with the Detroit Land Bank to
remodel houses and resell them to Detroit
citizens, and Build Institute, which supports
and educates young entrepreneurs in South-
west Detroit.
“I’ve wanted to work for (Gilbert) since I
was in high school,” Timmer said. “I came in
to last summer thinking that I just wanted
to be involved in some way, and now I think
my main goal at the University of Michigan
and in my career is to develop myself into
being the best asset for Detroit as possible …
so I can be dropped into anything and make
myself as useful as possible.”
In her future, Timmer said, she can see
herself taking over Dutch Girl — though
she’s nervous about living up to the stan-
dard her parents and grandparents have set.
Whatever she ends up doing, she knows her
path will lead her back to Detroit at some
point, and she’s eager to make a difference
in any way she can.
As for this summer, Timmer’s plans are
still in the air, but she’s looking for projects
that will allow her to get even more hands-
on in the city. And, of course, she’ll be work-
ing at the doughnut shop.
Arrie Timmer
During her senior year of high school, Reid
Depowski took her first college-level psychology
class. She fell in love with the subject. This same
year she lost her mother to suicide.
“This was a really pivotal moment in my life,
in realizing such an important moment of men-
tal health, despair and seeing the opportunities
my mother didn’t have for her mental health,”
Depowski, who is now an LSA senior, said. “And
so, this was kind of a snowball effect — I was
already getting so interested in psychology and
mental health.”
After this, Depowski became involved with the
American Foundation of Suicide Prevention as a
volunteer. Her developing passion for psychol-
ogy continued when she enrolled at the Univer-
sity of Michigan, where she joined Active Minds
and CAPS in
Action — both
organizations
that
promote
mental
health
awareness.
As
part
of
the
national
organization,
Depowski helps
plan expert pan-
els for Active
Minds.
For
instance,
she’s
brought experts
to campus to
discuss
eating
disorders. The aim here, she explains, is
to break down myths and provide real
answers about mental health.
CAPS in Action is a student group partnered
with the University of Michigan’s Counseling
And Psychological Services that spreads the
word of the psychological work on campus. One
such project she is working on is a video fea-
turing the stories of campus leaders who have
struggled with mental health in an effort to des-
tigmatize depression or mental illness.
It was with AFSP, however, that Depow-
ski found personal connections with those who
faced similar struggles.
“I have met people who have scary simi-
larities to my story,” she said. “People who have
been through the exact same thing I have, down
to the details. It can feel very isolating to have
gone through this loss that some people gasp at.
So when you meet another individual who has
gone through the same thing you have, it is, like,
a burden lifted off of you. Like, someone gets it.
Someone knows. … The connection you make
with other suicide loss survivors, it’s priceless.”
One of AFSP’s largest events is the Out of the
Darkness Walk, an event promoting suicide pre-
vention. After helping to plan her home county’s
walk, Depowski realized she could bring the first
Out of the Darkness Walk to the University —
which came to Ann Arbor on April 9.
“I was like, ‘This is possible. I know I could
make this happen,’ ” she said.
It was a quick turnover — planning with
the Michigan chair of AFSP in early Decem-
ber, Depowski went through the heavy
paperwork process to secure a walk in Nich-
ols Arboretum.
Four hundred walkers participated in the
event, which raised $28,000 — half of which
will fund the University’s mental health
resources. Depowski’s committee decides
where those funds will be allocated.
Depowski explained that sometimes it
could be hard, intimidating even, to tackle
mental health since it was so encompassing
on campus and required everyone — stu-
dents, professors and administration alike —
to be on board.
“Sadness, in American culture, is seen as a
weakness. ‘You’re not sad, you’re not special’
sort of thing,” she said. “Specifically in suicide
culture, something I am so passionate about,
is that suicide is not really a choice for people.
It’s not something they do to burden others.
It’s not something people do out of revenge,
it’s not something people do for attention.”
Depowski also found comfort outside of
the academic and activist realm. Despite
being disconnected from her father after her
mother’s passing, she has found a home with
her aunt.
“She has become my closest family mem-
ber besides my sister,” she said. “Our connec-
tion has blossomed since the loss of my mom.
… My mom’s family is very small, so having
my aunt, my sister and, of course, my grand-
parents in conjunction to an entire family
who has loved me and accepted me as their
own has been very healing to me and has
helped work me through a lot of this grief I
experienced.”
As for the future, Depowski has been
accepted to the University’s School of Social
Work, where she hopes to become a licensed
clinical social worker. While she plans to stay
involved with her organization, Depowski
views this next part of her life as the biggest
step to her goals.
“It feels like I am finally entering the stage
in my life where I am going to make these
changes happen for other people,” she said.
“I have benefitted so much from talk-therapy
that I want to bring that to other people.”
Ultimately, Depowski believes she owes
much of her drive to her mother.
“My mother really encouraged me in
school,” she said. “I owe so much of who I
am today to her. She was not a mental health
advocate, but she gave me a lot of her spirit
and fight to make these things happen — to
find the motivation to do this type of work.”
BY NISA KHAN, Daily News Editor
BY MAYA GOLDMAN, Daily Staff Reporter
Reid Depowski