The goals of Imagining America are lofty, to put it mildly. “Imagining America is an organization whose mission is to really help students, scholars and community groups to work together on the most pressing issues of our time,” explained Erica Kohl-Arenas, associate professor of American studies at UC Davis and faculty director of Imagining America: Artists and Scholars in Public Life. The civic-engagement consortium of more than 100 academic institutions and cultural organizations moved its national headquarters to UCD this past summer, and Kohl-Arenas moved to be with it.&nbs