It was hot — August-in-Los-Angeles hot — and a small band of USC students trudged along a half-mile corridor of the L.A. River through bird poop and algae, surrounded by steep, concrete walls.
The students, armed with camera gear and note pads, were on a six-day journey to document the river’s ecology for a project they dubbed “fifty-one miles,” named after the length of the man-made watershed.
An undertaking of that scale would’ve been impossible without money for gear, food, first aid and compensating contributors. That’s where USC’s Arts & Climate Collective came in, an organization that awards small grants to student-run projects like fifty-one miles that look to tackle environmental issues.
“It’s $1,300 — but there’s so much you can do with that,” said Leslie Dinkin, a master’s student studying heritage conservation and landscape architecture who worked on the fifty-one miles project.
Applications for this semester’s grants are open through Sept. 24 and pose the question: How would you reimagine L.A. as a healthy, equitable and sustainable city? It’s an intentionally open-ended question, said Colin Maclay, an Annenberg professor who co-founded the program.
“One of the problems with a university is that in classes, you’re always being told what to do in a kind of a narrow way,” Maclay said. “But we thought, ‘Who are we to say what you should work on? You all know better than us.’”
Maclay said the Collective isn’t necessarily looking for projects that will make an immediate impact on climate policies, or even generate the most web views or likes on social media. The group instead looks for projects that align with the program’s mission, and for students who bring real passion.
In the past, students have created podcasts to highlight climate activists; documentaries to push USC to divest from fossil fuel investments; a “phone booth” where people could record their feelings and others could listen in; and a series of movement performance pieces meant to raise climate awareness.
“We don’t require reels or portfolios: The only thing we’re looking for is passion and vision,” said Au Chung, a junior studying political science, public relations and screenwriting who runs the Collective’s social media pages. “Really think about your project. How are you going to do it? Why are you going to do it? And when you ask yourself those questions, make sure that those things are answered on the application.”
The goals are fairly open-ended for the fifty-one miles project, which won its grant last fall. Dinkin said the group — which plans to release a six-part documentary, a book and a detailed map of the river — at least in part hopes to capture a snapshot of the watershed’s current state that can help inform efforts to expand public access to the open space.
“I found it fascinating how people adapt to a space that wasn’t designed for them,” Dinkin said. “The river was designed with exclusively flooding in mind, but people are drawn to water. People are drawn to the river that allowed L.A. to be established here.”
Maclay said that the Collective ultimately has a limited number of grants it can afford to dole out and will look to fund a range of projects from students who hail from a diverse set of backgrounds.
“My advice is: Don’t try to please us,” Maclay said. “Write down whatever it is you want to do. This is your moment to not try to please the professor.”