#great-salt-lake

#great-salt-lake

Since Donald Trump's return to the presidency, student journalists have been instrumental in covering his administration's attacks on everything from the gutting of the Department of Education, to the rollback of diversity and equity initiatives, to the crackdown on free speech and attempted deportation of international students speaking out on Palestine. During this time of increased repression, we remain proud-as well as astonished-to be alone among national news outlets in regularly publishing student perspectives.

Resorts such as Alta and Snowbird regularly see average annual snowfall totals north of 500 inches of light, dry snow. This is no coincidence, as these mammoth totals are largely thanks to a phenomenon known as the lake effect, in which cold air moving over a body of water picks up moisture from the lake's surface. That moisture is then deposited in nearby mountains as light, fluffy snow-perfect for skiing and riding (or just skiing, in Alta's case).

Augustus Doricko, founder and CEO of cloud-seeding startup Rainmaker, surveys the sky from a sunbaked hillside 5 miles from Utah's Great Salt Lake. On this balmy Sunday afternoon in late September, the lake is calm, but its serenity belies a potentially catastrophic problem: The Great Salt Lake is shrinking-and is at risk of disappearing altogether. At its peak 40 years ago, the lake covered 2,300 square miles; today, more than 800 square miles of lake bed are exposed.

When I first encountered the Great Salt Lake and was introduced to the complex issues that are affecting the lake, I asked myself what art could contribute to the discussion,