MY COMMUNITY INTERVIEWS
USC Annenberg Wildfire Youth Media Initiative x Angelina Wang
"It’ll be a constant construction site for years, but it’s like a pioneer town now — everyone has to find their niche and contribute to bring it back"
--- Interviewee from the Pacific Palisades Fire
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INTERVIEWS AT KCRW
One of the highlights were community listening sessions hosted at KCRW, where we shared these voices with a broader public. Sitting in a professional studio, watching the red light of the microphone flick on, I felt the weight of responsibility. This wasn’t just my story anymore. It was the story of neighbors who had lost homes, friends, and routines to fire.Being recorded and watching others being interviewed too, I realized how powerful youth storytelling can be. Words carry urgency to policymakers, empathy to listeners, and courage to survivors. The Wildfire Youth Media Initiative gave me a platform, but more importantly, it reminded me that student journalism can help communities grieve, reflect, and begin to rebuild towards a future.
When the Pasadena fire hit, my story didn’t end at the evacuation texts—it became part of a larger project to preserve community memory. I was selected to be a Peer Storyteller for the USC Annenberg Center on Communication Leadership and Policy’s Wildfire Youth Media Initiative, a summer program training high schoolers in Altadena and the Palisades to record and share stories of the January 2025 wildfires.
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INTERVIEW ARCHIVE