Back in 2010, years before Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez caught the nation’s attention with her Green New Deal proposal, Jon Rynn was already pushing the plan. Students packed into a mid-size lecture hall at Santa Monica College (SMC) last week to hear Rynn speak about the Green New Deal as part of SMC’s Earth Week lecture series. The crowd overflow left many standing in the aisles.

In a brightly-lit studio in Santa Monica College’s (SMC) Core Performance Center, female students line up in front of a bank of mirrors to stretch, warming up for a rigorous hour and a half of self-defense instruction. The 16-week, one-credit course meets on Mondays and Wednesdays, and teaches students practical, hands-on methods to protect themselves from assault.

Avengers: Endgame opened in local theaters April 25, breaking box office records. A staggering earning of $1.2 billion worldwide was reported as of Sunday morning, as thousands of movie theater chains scrambled to add more showtimes to accommodate ticket demands.

Trump supporters stood shoulder to shoulder with hardline Socialists, united in their cheer for their new hero. “Yang Gang, Yang Gang, Yang Gang!” The mantra erupted from the mouths of hundreds of supporters who stood in Pershing Square in downtown Los Angeles on Easter Sunday t

There's a lot of joy to be found in browsing the shelves of Ulta, Sephora, or a local drugstore, searching for the perfect ruby-red lipstick or picking out a new face mask. The stores are lined with rows upon rows of colorful boxes, bottles, tubes, and palettes, each promising to help potential buyers look their very best.

On the evening of April 24, people flocked to Santa Monica City Hall decked in denim jackets, jeans and t-shirts. This crowd’s matching attire was no coincidence; all arrived to attend the city’s third annual Denim Day gathering. Santa Monica’s event was organized by the Commission on the Status of Women and included a multitude of speakers, performances and tabling by various sexual violence activist groups.

Four punching bags sway gently in a large, white-brick room. Rows of bright yellow boxing gloves adorn the adjacent wall, waiting to be put on. In the corner, a makeshift boxing ring stands, beckoning passersby to "get off the ropes" and "knock debt out."

While navigating Santa Monica’s traffic-filled streets, one may be too focused on avoiding a fender bender to notice UnUrban Coffee House on the corner of Pico Blvd and Urban Ave. However, this shop has acted as a hub for community and caffeine since its doors opened in 1995.

Irvin Meneses stood calmly defiant at the dais. He wore a grey beanie and a T-shirt displaying a cartoon image of President Donald Trump being shot in the head. Meneses recited his poem with nonchalance, dropping words into the audience like hand grenades.

A young woman on the 757 Los Angeles Metro bus headed south from Hollywood watches a music video of late rapper Nipsey Hussle in which his killer is seen next to him. “It really be ya own people sometimes,” she says as she shakes her head from side to side.

During Club Awareness Day, which took place on main campus on March 28, the quad hosted much more than just clubs scouting new members. There were also small groups of international students concentrating for the purpose of letting other students like themselves know they are there to support each other while promoting a club.

Fans turn out to say goodbye to Nipsey Hussle, wearing his image on their clothing, along Slauson Avenue in Los Angeles, California on April 11, 2019. The hearse carrying the casket of the slain rapper, Nipsey Hussle,

Jon Mayer (not the pop star) is a Jazz pianist who has recorded with John Coltrane and led bands with celebrated jazz musicians like Billy Higgins and Ron Carter. His career began in New York in the 1950s, and it took him to places like France where he performed with Chet Baker at the Blue Note Jazz Club. His path even landed him some gigs writing material for Barry White’s Love Unlimited Orchestra.

The students grasped their soldering irons with sweaty shaking hands as they attempted to melt metal onto the heart-shaped circuit boards in small exacting pinpoints. Keeping close as possible to their iron, white puffs of smoke rose to their faces as they tried not to inhale the potentially harmful fumes of burning metal. 

The squares of white paper float in the water, drifting aimlessly in the inflatable pool. A group of students stand around, watching as a girl crouches down and gently offers her own paper to the water. The blue ink from the marker bleeds, and the hateful words scrawled on the piece of paper blur, first becoming illegible, then dissolving altogether. 

The blue walls of the spacious Cayton Center housed more people than usual. The often present crowds of cliques, divided into tables were now a minority. Instead, a group of students sat stone-faced before two podiums, their eyes glued to the two speakers debating the issue of women’s rights.