Catherine Cloutier is a multimedia journalist. She has experience in breaking news reporting, feature writing, editing, multimedia production, web production and social media management.
Illuminating Watts: The Story of a Los Angeles Neighborhood in Transition

Illuminating Watts: The Story of a Los Angeles Neighborhood in Transition

This Master’s thesis project explores the South Los Angeles community as it attempts to moves beyond a violent history into a brighter future. Using multimedia storytelling, this project investigates public housing, education and law enforcement issues in the context of the community of Watts.
Schooled: The Price of Education Reform

Schooled: The Price of Education Reform

Billions of philanthropic dollars are spent each year to assuage the budget shortfalls of the nation’s urban school districts. But the money comes tied to a strict agenda. With the Obama administration leading the charge and philanthropists like Bill Gates, Eli Broad, and the Walton family footing the bill, America’s...
The Triangle Fire and the Media: 100 Years Later

The Triangle Fire and the Media: 100 Years Later

After the smoke cleared on March 25, 1911, the sidewalks surrounding the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory were covered in blood. The coffined bodies of the 146 dead — mostly Irish, Italian and Jewish factory workers — lined the morgue pier. Firefighters found 14 engagement rings on the charred factory floor, where...
A Look Into L.A. Unified: Millikan Middle School

A Look Into L.A. Unified: Millikan Middle School

Teacher Sheila McGuckin sat on a stool with a workbook in hand at the front of her sixth grade English class at Millikan Middle School in Sherman Oaks. Elevated above her students, her eyes scanned the class as she spoke. The Monday morning light streamed through the translucent banners of...
Sending Flowers to Los Angeles

Sending Flowers to Los Angeles

A little after midnight, a shipment of baby’s breath arrived at the Los Angeles Flower Market. It was not an unusual occurrence. In fact, that shipment arrived at that time each week. But the employees who unloaded the hundreds of bushels from the unmarked truck parked conspicuously on a deserted...
Latest entries
Behind the School Board Election, a Football Stadium?

Behind the School Board Election, a Football Stadium?

With independent expenditures totaling well over $3 million, the Los Angeles Unified school board election has become a battle of special interests — of unions, charter schools, and surprisingly, stadium operators — and the candidate winning the greatest share of that pie is Luis Sanchez in District 5. At first glance, the race seems to...
Looking Back: The Studio Drive-In

Looking Back: The Studio Drive-In

Bob Richardson took his 7-year-old daughter to the Studio Drive-In to see “Jaws” in 1975. Sitting at the bar of the Tattle Tale Room, Richardson reminisced about that night as he nursed a Budweiser in a frosted glass. “She stood on the backseat during the movie,” he said. “So she could duck behind the seat...
Lost Angeles: Exploring Urban History

Lost Angeles: Exploring Urban History

Lost Angeles features multimedia packages investigating the history behind some of Los Angeles’ most prominent landmarks and neighborhoods. The website seeks to visually display the intersection of the past and present in this urban landscape. Developed by the team of Karen Choi, Patrick Crawley and Piya Sinha-Roy, it was designed for its focus on photographs...
Rebirthing the Birthplace of Entertainment

Rebirthing the Birthplace of Entertainment

The large electric sign that rose above Clune’s Broadway once read “The Time, the Place.” Opened in 1910, Clune’s Broadway was one of the first two theatres built on Broadway in Downtown Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Times described the theatre as “handsome” and “elaborate” upon its opening. Clune’s Broadway, which was also known as...
Shave and a Haircut at Rudy's Barber Shop

Shave and a Haircut at Rudy’s Barber Shop

Like most barbershops, Rudy’s Barber Shop bears a red and white cylinder on its sign. Its exterior is bold and brightly colored, a clear distinction from its burger joint neighbor. Sketched on the large panes of glass at Rudy’s storefront is the price of a haircut: to some a whopping $12, to others, a darned...
One Square Mile: Eight Reporters Cover a Patch of Culver City

One Square Mile: Eight Reporters Cover a Patch of Culver City

One Square Mile was a project-based class with an emphasis on hyper-local reporting. In collaboration with Culver City Patch.com, the eight reporters in the class covered one square mile made up of Fox Hills neighborhood in Culver City. The reporters’ work was featured on Culver City Patch’s website and on the website below. I designed...