Rivers Are Life — Storytelling that Sparks Stewardship - Katie Horning
About Katie Horning
Katie Horning is a water steward based in Michigan. She serves as Chair of the River Days Festival in Midland and is a leader of the online platform Rivers are Life. Rivers are Life’s mission is to build awareness of and connection with rivers and, in doing so, inspire action to protect, preserve, and explore them. One way Katie does this is she promotes the projects of River Heroes. She believes highlighting these projects is an impactful way to showcase the value of rivers.
Great Lakes Roots and the Power of River Storytelling
Katie Horning grew up in Michigan, where water isn’t just scenery—it’s a way of life. Summers spent on Lake Michigan shaped her connection to the outdoors, teaching her to fish, boat, and respect the water. Surrounded by the Great Lakes, she developed a deep appreciation for natural resources and what it means to be a Michigander.
She studied graphic design and business at Ferris State University and launched her own design business in 2014. During the COVID-19 pandemic, an opportunity with BeAlive allowed her to align her work with her values—bringing together creativity, sustainability, and storytelling.
That work led to Rivers are Life, a platform focused on freshwater systems and the communities protecting them. While many environmental efforts center on oceans, this initiative highlights the rivers, lakes, and streams that feed them. With support from partners like Dow Chemical Company and Louisiana State University, the platform has grown into a movement rooted in awareness and action.
At its core are “River Heroes”—individuals creating real change. One example is Cash Daniels, known as the “Conservation Kid,” who builds recycling containers for fishing line to protect waterways.
Katie leads brand and storytelling efforts, ensuring these stories reach wider audiences through media, social content, and toolkits that help each hero expand their impact. The goal is not just to tell stories, but to give people the tools and visibility to grow their mission.
Her perspective is clear: river and ocean communities are deeply connected, and protecting one supports the other. Real impact starts locally—through volunteering, supporting community efforts, or simply paying closer attention to the water around you.
Because protecting our water starts where we live.
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00:00:00 Pamela Ferris-Olson Today on the Wo(men) Mind the Water Artivist Series on womenmindthewater.com, I'm speaking with Katie Horning. Katie is a water stewart based in Michigan. She serves as chair of the River Days Festival in Midland and is a leader at Rivers are Life. Rivers of Life is a digital platform dedicated to raising awareness of the fragility and importance of the world's river systems.
The Wo(men) Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast on womenmindthewater.com engages artists and conversation about their work and explores their connection with the ocean through their stories. Wo(men) Mind the Water hopes to inspire and encourage action to protect the ocean and her creatures.
I am speaking with Katie Horning an active community member in Midland, Michigan, where she is chair of the River Days Festival. Katie is also a leader of the online platform Rivers are Life. Rivers are Life's mission is to build awareness of and connection with rivers, and in doing so, inspire action to protect, preserve and explore them. One way they do this is to support the projects of River Heroes. Highlighting these projects is an impactful way to showcase the value of rivers. Rivers are Life connects local work with the overall importance of rivers and our planet’s well-being.
Welcome, Katie. Thank you for reaching out to womeninthewater.com to tell us about your work. You may not be aware that Wo(men) Mind the Water’s first project was a digital stories project that shared stories about human connection with water and with time Wo(men) Mind the Water began to focus on stories centered on the ocean. Rivers are Life is an important reminder that our planet’s overall health depends on both fresh and salt water. The two are intrinsically entwined. Rivers flow to the sea and the sea is the engine behind the weather needed to feed freshwater resources, including rivers.
00:02:08 Katie, you live in Michigan State, often associated with freshwater. Michigan borders four of the five Great Lakes. They are lake Erie, Lake Huron, Lake Superior, and Lake Michigan.
What role do the lakes and rivers of Michigan play in your childhood?
00:02:26 Katie Horning Well, thank you Pam for inviting me to the podcast and for being so interested in Rivers are Life. You're right, growing up here in Michigan, the lakes play a huge part in our lives. So I was fortunate enough to be able to spend summers on Lake Michigan. And through that, you know, I learned how to fish and I learned how to boat. And really, we learn to love the water as a fresh water source. It is a very unique to Michigan to have so many Great Lakes surrounding us. But it's an awesome part of living in Michigan and I think as a Michigander enjoying the lakes and enjoying the land and the seasons is part of what makes Michigan such a beautiful place to live.
00:03:09 Pamela Ferris-Olson So moving forward in time, you started your own graphic design business in 2014. How did that lead you to assume a role in an organization focused on river ecosystems?
00:03:22 Katie Horning Yeah, that's a great question. So I went to Ferris State University for college. While I was in college, I studied not only graphic design but business. It was a bucket list item to own my own business by the time I hit a certain age and from learning in school and living in Michigan, sustainability and nature is really true to the core of who I am. And so as you know, my business progressed. The pandemic hit, lots of things changed, and the Be Alive opportunity showed up and it encompassed all of my passions into a role that really allowed me to make a difference in the world. It really shows you how being passionate about something at a young age and then studying about it, the opportunities are there if you're looking for them.
00:04:16 Pamela Ferris-Olson So tell us more about Rivers are Life. On its website, it describes itself as a network of individuals, nonprofit organizations, and corporate partners invested in the protection of rivers. Where did the seed for this idea begin?
00:04:32 Katie Horning Rivers are Life was created by Be Alive. Be Alive is a world class production studio and purpose-driven organization uniting the outdoor and sustainability communities. At Be Alive, we believe that moments matter and stories really have the power to change the world. And so thinking about that and thinking about Rivers are Life, these conversations kept happening. The idea that, you know, there are so many ocean stories and there's so many people focusing on the large bodies of water. But what about all the bodies that lead to the oceans? What about the waterways, the fresh water waterways? And so, as that conversation just kind of kept spiraling, more people chimed in. It was this concept of Rivers are our life. And then once you have the concept, how do you make it a reality? How do you bring that platform to life? And that is where our founding partner Dow was able to step in and take it from just this little seed of an idea to an actual platform. And together we're able to tell these river hero stories and we're able to do these events and engage the community. We have this great partnership and it's kind of been nuts and bolts of how Rivers are Life came to fruition.
00:05:49 Pamela Ferris-Olson So did I understand you? You said your partner was Dow, like in Dow Chemical. Or somebody whose name is Dow?
00:05:57 Katie Horning We're headquartered here in Midland and so as you know, if you know anything about Midland, it is home of the Dow Chemical Company. They are a science-based company and really realize that, you know, we're all part of the problem, but we're all part of the solution. And so they are one of our founding partners. We also have an exciting partnership with Louisiana State University. They are our first academic contributing partner. We are only a year old as Rivers are Life and the momentum is really growing. As additional partners come into play. We are getting to work with FedEx and the CRDC and the Global Alliance for Plastic Waste. So there's lots of players in each of the different films.
00:06:47 Pamela Ferris-Olson Very interesting. So as I understand it, Rivers are Life is a digital platform for sharing documentary film to highlight the work of River Heroes around the world. Katie, would you give us an example of a river hero so listeners might better understand the work Rivers are Life supports?
00:07:07 Katie Horning Sure. So our youngest river hero we had the pleasure of hosting at River Days here in Midland is Cash Daniels. His film is the Conservation Kid. And what he does in Tennessee is build these monofilament containers that collect fishing line waste. So when fisher people come off the water, they take all that fishing line waste and put it in these recycling containers. We work with Berkeley who has a reel and recycling program. They recycle all that fishing line and turn it into fishing habitats. So we brought cash in for this free community event. We showed his film on the first night and then the second day of the festival we built 50 of these monofilament containers which have been installed throughout the Great Lakes Bay Area like Saginaw Bay City and Midland. We had the pleasure of over the course of the weekend introducing Cash to all the youth in Midland, inspiring like this next generation of conservationists. That's just kind of one example of different projects we do at Rivers are Life. There's the films but there's also philanthropy behind Rivers are Life.
00:08:21 Pamela Ferris-Olson How do you go about identifying River Heroes? What are your criteria for including them in your River Heroes program?
00:08:29 Katie Horning Yeah, that's a great question. So identifying River Heroes is a really big challenge, right? There are people all over the world doing incredible things, not only on rivers, but on oceans. The task of identifying River Heroes falls to the Be Alive studio team. It's their mission to do the research and the identification of who these people are and interview them and find what the story is, and how to tell their story for Rivers are Life. They handle all the heavy lifting there. And when it comes to the brand side, that's where we get to do the magic of getting the story out.
00:09:14 Pamela Ferris-Olson So are there differences in how messages are received based on the audience’s demographic? How do you go about engaging people across the age spectrum?
00:09:21 Katie Horning Yeah, that's, you know interesting because not only are our stories told here in the United States but they're global. So there are differences on how audiences interact with the content. I think the biggest challenge we have is making sure audiences of all ages get to hear and get to see the films. So we market things across spectrum. We do everything from traditional press releases and traditional marketing tactics to social content that all the younger generations are engaging with. We also have these toolkits that we provide for our marketing for our River Heroes that allows them to take the assets that Rivers are Life has created: the social cutdowns, the reels, the press releases. It's translated so no matter what language they may speak, because some of our River Heroes don't speak English. They can use these resources to hit their audiences. At the end of the day, the goal for Rivers are Life with these films is for the River Heroes to have this great piece, this great story, to share, to fundraise with, to engage their audience, to help propel their mission as River Heroes.
00:10:36 Pamela Ferris-Olson Take us through the steps from selecting a message to developing a design for communicating that message.
00:10:43 Katie Horning Yeah, sure. So the steps, as I stated, they kind of start in studio. They come up with these River Heroes and they give us like a one pager. The brand side and the studio meet and we talk about what the story is. A good example is the film that premiered in September on the 15th. Study Aboard is a film that highlights Chad Pregracke who founded the nonprofit Living Lands & Water. They host an alternative spring break. After studio kind of fills brand in that we're going to do a film about an alternative spring break where college kids come spend a week on a river cleaning up trash. They fill us in on all the details. We get to meet with the river hero and we learn what he's interested in and the story he's hoping to tell. Then we start marketing it out, build a strategy. We talk with all the key players. We really decide, you know, what areas we want to focus on, how we want to get this out on social media and think about what interviews we want them to be on. It's really just building out a strategy for marketing, just like you would anything else.
00:11:57 Pamela Ferris-Olson What is one of the more interesting things that you have learned working with Rivers are Life?
00:12:04 Katie Horning I think one of the most interesting things I've learned working at Rivers are Life , it's really that every story is different. You think of rivers and you think, “Oh well, every river it's just a river but every river is different. Every river hero is different.
Everybody's moments that matter are different and they're each interesting. I was listening to some of your podcasts, you know, in preparation to come on the podcast. And I thought, these are all incredible women and each one of their stories are different. And it's exactly like that here at Rivers are Life. All the people we meet at Rivers are Life are incredible. They're doing these inspirational things and I think that's the best part of my job. In essence, we're like the hype people for these stories. For these, you know, inspirational people out there making a huge difference.
00:12:58 Pamela Ferris-Olson Anything else you'd like to share about your work for or the work of Rivers are Life?
00:13:13 Katie Horning I think it’s really important thing to note that river and ocean organizations can work together, hand in hand. I mean, they all flow together at the end and so all of us coming together can make a really big difference. So I encourage you to, you know, do your part, join the movement, support our River Heroes and just, you know, spend some time enjoying the content.
00:13:25 Pamela Ferris-Olson Well, I can definitely sense your enthusiasm in your voice. It makes me want to just go right out to the [Rivers are Life] site and I will do that. Hopefully my listeners will too. So finally, Katie, as I do with all my guests, I ask for a call to action. Can you tell the audience what they can do to help their rivers and oceans?
00:13:48 Katie Horning Yeah, sure. So every river starts with a drop, so I encourage everybody to do whatever you can to get involved and start where you are. You can learn more about the role you can play in your river or your ocean just by, you know, checking out local community centers or your local community foundation. Volunteer at cleanup events get engaged. Should your local area not have a water foundation, you could be the inspirational person kicking off the change in your community. Again, check out Rivers are Life dotcom to see how some of our River Heroes got started in their river programs. All of us can make a difference, it's just one little thing at a time.
00:14:37 Pamela Ferris-Olson So I'd like to remind our listeners that I've been speaking with Katie Horning. Katie is the leader of the online platform Rivers are Life, an organization that uses storytelling to share the importance of rivers, and in doing so, inspire action to improve, protect and preserve them. Katie works locally with the River Day Festival in Midland, Michigan. In both these ways, Katie celebrates the importance of rivers to our planets well-being.
Katie Horning is the latest guest on the Wo(men) Mind the Water Artivist Series podcast. The series can be viewed on womenmidwater.com, Museum on Main Street and YouTube and audio only version of this podcast is available on womenmindthewater.com on iTunes and Spotify.
Wo(men) Mind the Water is grateful to Jaine Rice for the use of her song women of water, all rights for the Wo(men) Mind the Water, name and logo belonged to Pam Ferris-Olson. This is Pam Ferris-Olson.
