2025 Middle School Winners

David Unatin is in the 8th grade and Danny Unatin is in the 6th grade at Manhattan Beach Middle School in Manhattan Beach, California. David found the World of 8 Billion contest while looking for an opportunity to extend his learning about the impacts of rain runoff, something he is passionate about. They were aware of population and its impacts prior to creating their video but learned a lot more through the filmmaking process. For instance, Danny shared that 10 billion gallons of dirty runoff enters the beach on a rainy day in Los Angeles. He learned that this happens because the rain picks up dirt from the roads and carries it to the coast due to the lack of permeable soil. Recent wildfires have amplified the problem, and the brothers decided to brainstorm ways to help.

David shared that during their research they saw the work being done at the UCLA SEALab and thought it would make the video interesting if they were able to do some work with them. He reached out to SEALab and was able to see how they tested water quality with different soil columns as shown in the video. David has been in film class for three years, and while they’ve both created a lot of videos, this was the first with a one-minute time limit. Their original video was 2.5 minutes and it was challenging to edit it down to fit within the guidelines of the contest. They taught themselves to use CapCut to edit the video. Advice they have for future participants is to find a topic you are passionate about and don’t give up on condensing your message into the time limit, even if it is hard.

David and Danny like to spend time at the beach. They both attended a summer camp that provided lifeguard training and also taught them how to help animals that are washed up on shore – an experience which ignited their interest in the topic of their video. David plays soccer and surfs, and Danny plays soccer and football. In the future David plans on continuing to do projects on the impacts of urban runoff and hopes to go into engineering to find ways to combat this problem. Danny is interested in business and challenges that require teamwork. He enjoys spreading the word on environmental challenges in the hopes that more people will get involved in creating solutions.