USC Environmental Health Centers
Current news, events and research projects of the Environmental Health Centers based at USC
A Day in the Life StoryMap: a detailed look at the projects of A Day in the Life participants.
Participants of A Day in the Life presented at the national Citizen Science Conference, in Raleigh, North Carolina on March 16, 2019.
Building Collaboration and Ensuring Justice in Community-Based Participatory Research: Lessons Learned from California, South Carolina, and Michigan.
Read the story here.
"A Day in the Life" program is supported in part by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences. In February 2019, the program was featured in NIEHS Environmental Factor newsletter. Read the article here.
Participants in the first cohort of A Day in the Life gathered at USC Environmental Health Centers on June 30, 2018 at the LA Youth Environmental Justice Forum to share about their projects.
Find out more about the first cohort of youth who participated in A Day in the Life.
18 youth participants, from 3 community based organizations, representing 9 high schools, collected 340 hours of data with AirBeam2 monitors. Read more about the program here. See the StoryMap showcasing youth air monitoring maps and photos here.
A Day in the Life program is open for students who identify as a student of color. Due to the hands-on and time commitment of the program, we ask that youth participants be affiliated with and supported by a community based environmental justice organization or environmental/STEM school club faculty sponsor. Program participation requires youth participants to commit to attending all program workshops and meetings.
Workshop: Storytelling for Social Change
This workshop will provide you with the skills to capture and craft your story, learn camera shots, angles and editing to support your narrative to inform, empower & transform!
Workshop leader: Sandy Navarro, LA Grit Media and South LA community organizer
Take pictures and make notes of what you see and experience during the course of your day: at home, at school, pollution sources, parks, stores, places you hang out.
Come back together with students from your local organization to talk about your experience recording your day and planning your next steps as you prepare your story together and edit it, to share with others.
Once all students from the participating organizations have completed their A Day in the Life story over the course of a given program year, participants gather in one space to share their final stories, talk about their experiences, learn from each other about what it means to live in their respective community.
The 2017-2018 A Day in the Life program participants shared their stories at our #LAYouth4EJ event that took place on June 30, 2018.
The 2017-2018 participating organizations and youth led groups included:
Communities for a Better Environment
South Central Youth Leadership Coalition
LA Grit Media
Promoting Youth Advocacy, Mark Keppel High School, Alhambra
The 2019 A Day in the Life program participants included youth members from Pacoima Beautiful who are part of the Youth United Towards Environmental Protection program.
For more information about A Day in the Life please email Wendy Gutschow.
AirCasting and AirBeam Operations Manual: Wendy Gutschow, USC Environmental Health Centers
Other files used during workshops are available on request.
What were the levels of PM 2.5 on a particular day or week in the region? Click here to find out.
Do you want to see what some of the PurpleAir stationary PM 2.5 monitors are reading at a given time? Check out the PurpleAir monitors in the LA area here.