Henry Kamer participating in the USC Wildfire Youth Media Initiative.
BY HENRY KAMER
The past month has been one of the most impactful months in my life, second to January 2025. The past month I was one of the people chosen to be part of the USC Annenberg Wildfire Youth Media Initiative.
The program was born out of a combination of two elements: the decline of traditional news, whether that be print or TV/radio, and the destruction caused by the Palisades and Eaton fires in January 2025.
Talia Abrahamson, Junior Fellow at the USC Center on Communication, Leadership, and Policy (CCLP), had the idea to develop a program where high school journalists went into the field and reported on what was occurring in the Palisades and Altadena, while the world resumed life as normal. She gave the idea to Geoffrey Cowan, director of the CCLP, former USC Annenberg dean, and former director of Voice of America, and he thought it was excellent
One of the hopes was that this program would revive the local journalism industry by giving it a young appearance. The youth increasingly get their news from social media (even I, as a junior news reporter, am guilty of this.)
The program was launched to the public through every means available – whether by reaching out to respective high schools in the two areas to announcing it to local news outlets to getting in touch with key community individuals or organizations.
Talia and Geoff had no idea if there would be any applicants, but 77 high schoolers – all rising juniors and seniors – applied to the program. After making tough decisions, 18 (nine from the Palisades, nine from Altadena/Greater Pasadena area) were chosen.
The program lasted a little less than a month, starting on July 15 and ending on August 7, which was the seventh month anniversary of the fires. Its official mission was – and is – to record oral stories from those who experienced the fires in both communities, and to store these experiences in the Los Angeles Public Library as a historical record of what occurred through these terrible disasters.
We partially accomplished this through field interviews in the Palisades and Altadena. Community listening sessions were conducted at KCRW in Santa Monica and at the Pasadena Playhouse on two Saturdays. I say partially because there are still so many stories left unheard in both communities.
As for what community listening sessions are, they are a unique event in which community members could come tell their stories by us asking them questions such as “What was your favorite community memory?” to “What do you want to see for the future of your community?” to “What have you lost and found as a result of the fires?” all encouraging conversation and healing through storytelling.
Storytelling was definitely a main theme of the program, as there were many lunch guests ranging from professional journalists and reporters to masters of visual and audio storytelling from prominent organizations like KCRW to USC professionals and organizations that were instrumental in the process of recovery after the fires who came to USC to speak with us.
We conducted more than 100 interviews over the course of the program and created self-reflections of all different media: from written to podcasts and even audio. More than that, I learned so many impactful lessons of how to be a better and more empathetic listener, journalist, and overall human being.
I got to hear so many tragic yet inspiring stories and got to meet so many wonderful people from all over the city that I would have never gotten the chance to meet. However, one downside to the program was that there weren’t any significant windows of time where we could really get to know one another (very different than a two-week English history course I studied at Oxford just before the program), but this program had more important things that required our attention.
Even with this lack of peer time, I still made lasting friendships. By the end of the program, I was known as the “Public Transit Guy,” as I loved taking the Metro E line from my rental house in Mar Vista to USC and back, and I embraced the A line as well when I made the exciting trip back from the Pasadena Playhouse. One of the students told me he was blown away by the fact that I was a Palisadian who loved taking public transit, which he thought was so awesome, and he sure let me know (shout out to you, Barrett!).
On the last day, we had a bittersweet graduation ceremony (parents invited) where our projects were showcased. Every student had a beautiful and unique topic they touched on in many different mediums.
For my project, I connected my experiences and interests to an inspiring artist that we interviewed, Cara Levine. Cara lost her childhood home in the Palisades and instead of surrendering to the devastation she experienced, she noticed lots of broken ceramics scattered among the remains of her home and launched into her artistic side.
She has started two projects: a ceramics project where people from the Palisades and Altadena sent their broken ceramics to her to be stored in the garage of her Eagle Rock studio and a project called Silver Linings where people drew items important to them in a sandbox. This outline was then turned into metal by casting into pewter ingots, a silver-like metal. I felt Cara and I had both experienced a connection of the west and east sides of LA that are often thought to be completely different (her through her projects, me through the program) and also a connection in historical projects (her collecting and “creating” sentimental physical items, me creating Palisades Stories (we’re still looking for more stories!).
Cara is one of the artists who wants to create a piece of art (her Palisades ceramics collection) in the Village Green. I support her in this and send her my kudos.
I truly appreciate what she is doing for both communities, fostering a close-knit community feeling and recording history. I hope her work can be appreciated as much I appreciate it, as I have sensed that artists and art are not considered effective ways of healing in times of crisis, even though they can contribute so much.
I am attaching my USC self-reflection here for anyone who is interested: Finding the Light in the Dark – Cara Levine (please note, some of the videos are not able to play because of a file mistake I made. Apologies.)
All in all, I am so thankful I was able to be a part of this beautiful cohort. I have grown so much as a person in these four weeks as I have been exposed to so many different perspectives and stories.
I have developed tremendously as a writer and so has my love for the field of journalism. I am excited to see where the program goes, and I know the work that we all accomplished and the people I accomplished it with will always hold a special place in my heart. So, thank you, to all my peers and all the people at USC for making this an unforgettable summer and one of the most impactful months in my life. Fight on!
Henry Kamer joined eight students from Pacific Palisades and nine from Altadena/Palisades for a Wildfire Youth Media Initiative.
Bravo, Mr. Kamer!
What a terrific story.