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Leading lives of mystery throughout the shadowy depths of all the world’s oceans, sharks have long fascinated the public, in large part because of how little is known about their lives and behavior. Popular media has often promoted images of large, aggressive predators, but as we learn more we find most sharks are not dangerous to people and moreover are a vital part of many healthy ocean ecosystems.

One person who is striving to understand sharks close to home is Scripps Institution’s Dovi Kacev, who takes you on an illuminating journey into the Southern California Bight to learn about the sharks that make our offshore region their home.

Kacev grew up traveling between San Diego and South Africa, where animals and the ocean quickly became his passion. He holds a PhD in ecology from a joint program offered by San Diego State University and UC Davis and a BS in marine biology and economics from UCLA.

Watch Shark Geek: A Window into Shark Ecology in the Southern California Bight.

Where did we humans come from? When did we become the dominant species on the planet?

Evidence indicates that we all descended from a small population that arose in Africa about 200,000 years ago. Since then, that small population spread throughout the globe, interbreeding with other human-like species, picking up some of their DNA and eventually replacing all close evolutionary cousins – leaving only one human species.

In the last half-decade there has been a flood of new information from ancient DNA, fossils, archaeology and population studies.

Hear about how this has updated our knowledge from world renowned experts on The Origins of Today’s Humans.

An overwhelming scientific consensus demonstrates that cumulative adversity, particularly during critical and sensitive developmental periods, is a root cause to some of the most harmful, persistent and expensive health challenges facing our nation.

Dr. Nadine Burke Harris was appointed as California’s first-ever Surgeon General by Governor Gavin Newsom in January 2019. She is an award-winning physician, researcher and advocate dedicated to changing the way our society responds to childhood trauma.

Dr. Burke Harris’ career has been dedicated to serving vulnerable communities and combating the root causes of health disparities. After completing her residency at Stanford, she founded a clinic in one of San Francisco’s most underserved communities, Bayview Hunters Point. It was there that she observed that, despite the implementation of national best-practices for immunizations, asthma, obesity treatment and other preventive health measures, her patients still faced outsized risks for poor health, development and behavioral outcomes.

Drawing on research from the CDC and Kaiser Permanente, Dr. Burke Harris identified Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) as a major risk factor affecting the health of her patients. ACEs are traumatic events occurring before age 18 and include all types of abuse and neglect as well as parental mental illness, substance use, divorce, incarceration, and domestic violence.

In 2011, she founded the Center for Youth Wellness and subsequently grew the organization to be a national leader in the effort to advance pediatric medicine, raise public awareness, and transform the way society responds to children exposed to Adverse Childhood Experiences and toxic stress. She also founded and led the Bay Area Research Consortium on Toxic Stress and Health, to advance scientific screening and treatment of toxic stress.

Watch Applying the Science of Toxic Stress to Transform Outcomes in California.

Exploring the undersea world has always presented challenges in terms of cost and accessibility. However, recent advances in ocean observing technology are allowing researchers to explore heretofore unfamiliar worlds at reasonable cost.

Join oceanographer Jules Jaffe as he describes his career as an ocean explorer and technology innovator. Learn how new, cost effective instruments and platforms present unprecedented opportunities for students of all ages to engage in designing, building and experimenting with ocean observing technologies with examples from underwater robots to underwater microscopes.

Watch Squid Pro Quo – A Journey Into Undersea Exploration.

This year’s Writer’s Symposium by the Sea truly lives up to its theme, Writing that Liberates. From the Pulitzer Prize winning reporting of journalist Sonia Nazario, to the mind-opening work of Pico Iyer, to the iconic writing of Alice Walker, these interviews show how great writing can set us free both figuratively and literally. Join founder Dean Nelson as he welcomes three prolific writers to Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego.

Sonia Nazario
Sonia Nazario is an award-winning journalist best known for “Enrique’s Journey,” her story of a Honduran boy’s struggle to find his mother in the U.S. She details her harrowing reporting from the tops of trains barreling through Mexico, her turn from journalist to activist, and how her work on immigration is more relevant now than ever before.

Pico Iyer
Pico Iyer was named “arguably the world’s greatest living travel writer,” by Outside, and is the author of over a dozen books and countless essays. In this discussion, he regales the audience with tales of his extensive travels, discusses how walking helps him write, and explains why the neighbors in the small Japanese town he calls home have nicknamed him “parasite.”

Alice Walker
Alice Walker is an internationally celebrated American novelist, short story writer, poet, and activist, best known for her Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Color Purple. She discusses how she creates such relatable characters, the messages within her work, and shares insights into her unique perspective on the world.

Browse more programs in Writer’s Symposium By The Sea.