The Center for Art and Public Life has hosted the Impact Awards each year giving the students an opportunity to receive funding and mentorship for their impact project.

The CAPL Impact Awards celebrates creativity in advocating for equality, human rights, and social justice, especially in a time when personal freedoms are at risk. With the shifting political climate surrounding the U.S. Presidential election, activism alone may not be enough to drive change. Now, more than ever, we need new, innovative ways to cultivate empathy and understanding for differences and address urgent social issues. This year, we are looking for student projects that explore these challenges through social health design, including but not limited to gender equity, LGBTQ+ inclusivity, transgender rights, disability rights, and immigrant inclusion.

We seek art, design, and social entrepreneurship projects that fosters change, sparks dialogue, and promotes empathy to contribute to the well-being and harmony of society. Does your project tackle one of these key issues? Is it created to inspire action and provoke meaningful change? Whether through visual art, design, interactive projects, or digital media, we welcome all creative forms that promote knowledge, perspective, and understanding.

The Impact Awards offer an opportunity to further develop projects with support through funding, feedback, and mentorship. Whether you have identified a community partner or are just beginning with an idea, we are here to help you grow your idea. Apply for mentorship, brainstorming sessions, and partnership opportunities today. Help shape a more compassionate world where creativity fuels lasting impact.

Soft Matter is a design intervention aimed at rethinking the way materials can foster empathy, comfort, and human agency. By repurposing materials, including packaging beans, bubble wrap, scrap foam, and other waste materials, this project challenges the conventional, rigid design practices that often shape public spaces. Through soft, tactile elements, Soft Matter seeks to create environments that promote emotional well-being and inclusivity, encouraging individuals to form deeper connections with their surroundings. The project will feature a range of soft interventions, such as seating installations, cushions, and public art pieces, each designed to be interactive and inviting. These objects will evoke comfort and warmth, providing a stark contrast to the harsh, often impersonal nature of typical urban design. The use of recycled materials highlights sustainability, transforming waste into purposeful, inclusive design elements that prioritize comfort and connection. By reimagining materials as tools for human interaction, Soft Matter redefines public spaces as places of emotional engagement, where the design encourages reflection and personal connection. The ultimate goal is to create public environments that place empathy, human agency, and inclusivity at their core, sparking conversations about the potential of design to cultivate a more compassionate and just world.

Last year, a self-portrait project became an unexpected journey of self-discovery and radical acceptance. What began as an exploration of the relationship between myself and the camera evolved into profound personal transformation and an essay in Art Journal Open reflecting on the process. Now, I wish to share this powerful experience with others. I am seeking funding to extend this opportunity to Black women of diverse backgrounds, ages, and body types. Eleven participants across the United States—ranging from mid-30s to 80s—will form the inaugural workshop cohort. Each participant will receive a Polaroid camera, five packs of black and white film, self-portraiture tips, and reflective prompts. The process involves participants working through each film pack by specific deadlines, followed by group reflection sessions. This cycle repeats five times, fostering both personal exploration and community building. Upon completion, I'll conduct individual interviews, help select images for publishing, and facilitate a final group reflection. My previous work, Black in Denver, demonstrates my commitment to social practice projects centered on selfhood and community. This initiative feels particularly timely especially in light of the rise in authoritarianism and our current political climate. The enthusiastic response from participants to this project also confirms its resonance. Funding will support the pilot program, necessary supplies, artist sustenance, and lay groundwork for future cohorts and safe spaces where Black women can challenge limiting narratives and embrace self-love. While potentially culminating in a book or exhibition, the project's primary focus remains personal transformation and empowerment within a communal setting.

Non Alien Box is a mobile public art project that reclaims decommissioned newspaper boxes across San Francisco to share absurd, often invisible stories of non alien residents navigating the U.S. job market. Drawing from lived experience, the project exposes labor inequities shaped by visa restrictions—low wages, prolonged internships, and narrow employment paths—and uses humor and design to spark public reflection. Building on its first installation, Non Alien Box is an ever expanding project which includes an ongoing collection of stories and the creation of custom-designed “job ads” for those in need. Through collaborative workshops, we continue to help individuals from immigrant and precarious labor communities translate their personal stories into visual language, then distribute them via transformed newspaper boxes. Each box serves as a decentralized platform for underrepresented voices. It is an art object in gallery settings. It also is a functional, camouflaged communication tool in public space. As we gradually occupying more sites, this project will weave a visible network of presence, survival, and belonging across the urban landscape.

Impact Award Proposal: Mobile Libraries for Equity and Inclusion Our project, developed through CCA’s Social Lab in partnership with UNICEF Innovation Node, aims to bridge educational and accessibility gaps for underserved children, particularly refugees, children with disabilities, and those in “library deserts” where resources are scarce. Through an innovative redesign of the Bookmobile, we provide equitable access to knowledge, creativity, and critical thinking via a three-layered approach: 1. Mobile Library Access: Creating immersive, welcoming environments for children in underserved areas. 2. Digital Learning Integration: Offering tailored, age-appropriate resources to enhance cognitive growth and creativity. 3. Lifelong Learning Advocacy: Promoting continuous learning and empowerment regardless of socioeconomic background. By combining physical accessibility with digital resources, our solution seeks to reduce knowledge inequality, empower lifelong learners, and promote social inclusion. This initiative aligns with the Impact Award’s mission to foster creativity for social justice by providing tools for educational equity and belonging. Funding will support research, design development, and collaboration with stakeholders to refine and implement our vision. We aim to cultivate empathy and create lasting impact through inclusive design, making learning accessible for all.

In a world where 70% of Deaf and Hard of Hearing children lack access to language, Flourish stands as an innovative intervention at the critical intersection of disability rights, education equity, and social justice. Our community platform directly confronts language deprivation syndrome—a systematic form of injustice affecting future generations—by empowering hearing parents to make informed decisions during their child's crucial developmental window. Flourish revolutionizes support for these families through a three-pronged approach: First, our physical advocacy cards strategically placed in medical settings interrupt the medical model bias at diagnosis. Second, our digital platform creates an emotion-responsive community that breaks the "anxiety echo chamber" of current support groups. Third, our bilingual resources empower parents when medical professionals fail to present complete language access options. Our innovation lies in repositioning language access as a justice issue rather than a medical one. By targeting the earliest possible intervention moments—when parents first receive diagnoses—we maximize neurological development potential while cultivating a new generation of advocates. Learning from mentors and friends from Bay Area Deaf Association and California School of the Deaf, we’ve gauged genuine interest amongst many of the struggling parents of Deaf or HoH children community. In today's political landscape where disability rights face increasing precarity, Flourish creates a sustainable model for community-driven change. With your support, we'll scale from our Bay Area pilot to nationwide implementation, advancing justice through language access for generations to come.

In My Feathered Pajamas: Creative Interventions for Justice in a Changing World is a participatory art-making/storytelling project transforming San Francisco’s public spaces into sites of collective care, cultural memory, and social health by amplifying women’s contributions to each neighborhood, past and present. Led by interdisciplinary artist Badri Valian, the project centers AAPI, BIPOC, and other historically underrepresented women’s stories, emphasizing LGBTQ+ inclusion, disability justice, immigrant experiences, and intergenerational activism, all important to Badri, an immigrant with disabilities who has been exploring their gender identity and whose ancestors engaged in intergenerational activism against displacement in Iran. At each event, fabric and hand-crocheted feathers are gathered into a communal nest, symbolizing resilience, sanctuary, and collective healing. Participants select a feather and add the name of a woman they wish to honor, pinning it to an evolving feathered robe, creating a living sculpture embodying protection, transformation, and solidarity. Handouts share histories of women who have shaped local resistance, labor, and justice movements. Expanded in an online archive, these stories show how women have created change while providing radical community caregiving. By adding names of the women who inspire them today, participants take action to challenge male-dominant narratives in local history. Now more than ever, women’s voices, especially those of immigrants, caregivers, queer and disabled women, are vital. In 2025, reproductive rights, immigration enforcement, digital censorship, and housing insecurity disproportionately impact women of color. This project offers a living exxample of Social Health Design, sparking dialogue, inspiring action, and fostering belonging.

The media was once our compass in moments of crisis, a guardian of democracy and a source of truth. Today, many newsrooms have become magnifiers of division and distrust. Biased reporting, manipulative headlines, and unchecked narratives are often the first to misrepresent immigrants, people of color, and marginalized communities. The World Economic Forum found that only 23 percent of Americans believe national news organizations have the public’s best interests at heart. Our project asks: What would trustworthy news look like in a fragmented world? What if news were built for transparency instead of persuasion? We propose a reliability tracking system, a digital framework that exposes the scaffolding of news to the public. By exposing how stories are sourced, framed, and told, this project helps readers assess accuracy and reliability, decode bias, and become critical participants in holding newsrooms accountable. This system isn’t just about flagging fake news. This design solution is about restoring informational justice; ensuring that people have the right to understand not just what they’re being told but also how and why. This promotes factual density, source transparency, and clarity over emotional manipulation, equipping readers with tools to discern, question, challenge, and demand better. Our project is about reclaiming our right to truthful, multi-perspective storytelling in the news. In a world where truth feels contested, we believe trust can be rebuilt, not through control but through radical transparency. This is a creative intervention to protect our most urgent civic right: the right to know and to know better

Emergency preparedness systems are often designed with a universal standard in mind—but that standard rarely accounts for the diverse needs of children with disabilities. Across schools and public institutions, drills and protocols are implemented assuming that all children can hear alarms, follow verbal instructions, and move without assistance. This oversight leaves a significant population unprotected during crises. This project explores how emergency response systems can be reimagined to center the needs of children with physical, sensory, cognitive, and developmental disabilities. Through layered research involving policy analysis, field engagement, and stakeholder input, it identifies key gaps in both communication and implementation. The guiding question emerges from this tension: How might emergency systems be both standardized and responsive to the unique needs of children with disabilities? The challenge lies not only in developing inclusive materials but also in bridging policy and practice—ensuring that interventions are adaptable, scalable, and equitable. Rather than offering a single solution, the project opens a design space for creative interventions that span communication, education, and community infrastructure. It invites new approaches that can be co-developed with caregivers, educators, and advocates to foster preparedness rooted in justice and empathy. The CAPL Impact Award presents an opportunity to further this work through mentorship, iteration, and collaboration—toward a future where no child is left behind in a moment of crisis

Information:

Rubric here

2025 Impact Award Jurors:

Janette Kim

Josh Silverman

Pia Zaragoza

Susanne Cockrell