Wednesday, May 15

North Gate Hall - UC Berkeley Campus

3:30 - 4:00pm

Refreshments

4:00 - 5:00pm

Narrative Writing

Michael St. Martin was nearing the end of 10 years in California prisons for crimes of pedophilia. But instead of being released, he was psychologically evaluated and determined to be a high risk to reoffend. He was transferred
to a state hospital, where he has remained for the last seventeen years.

Investigators in Northern California’s Lake County busted a high-class sex trafficking operation in 2018, shocking many in the rural community. Even more startling, a woman born and raised in the county is charged with operating the illicit business with her husband. She claims she was manipulated into working for him.

From 1956 to 1970 more than 250 intellectually disabled children, aged
3 to 10, were forcibly infected with hepatitis in research funded by the U.S. military. The result was an experiment that revealed secrets of a deadly disease, caused a backlash in the medical community, and changed the boundaries of medical ethics forever.

Hassan made his way to safety after serving as a former translator for a U.S. military convoy in Afghanistan, but for many other interpreters caught between U.S. immigration law and Taliban threats, there appears to be no way out.

Suppressed for centuries, the Yurok and Karuk tribes in the Klamath River Valley of Northern California are revitalizing cultural burning practices. Their knowledge could provide a solution to the state’s growing wildfire problem.

5:00 - 5:20pm

Intermission

5:20- 6:30pm

Narrative Writing

Incredibly loud naval jets fly over Washington State's idyllic northwest. And that noise isn't just a nuisance— it's bad for folks' health. Expectations and experience—say, moving there to get away from life's hustle and bustle—exacerbate the toll the noise takes.

Our sense of smell is a powerful tool. Today, we use scent to find explosives, drugs, cadavers, and even to diagnose cancer. But our olfactory system is also a mystery.

In the weeks after Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico was plunged into a serious food crisis. Now, with scientists predicting a future of stronger tropical storms, farmers across the island are trying to figure out how to repair—and protect—their food system.

This story highlights young Sri Lankans’ efforts to reconcile their differences and heal trauma through narrative writing.

Since 2015, the number of strip clubs in New Orleans has been cut by half. A series of raids in January 2018 launched a loud and vocal resistance to these closures, led by strippers and other club workers. This story follows the year of the raids and the mixed motives and interests city officials and other denizens have in pushing for the closures, and the strippers’ resistance.

Tommie grew up in Odessa, a city in the heart of Texas oil country. Tommie made a living in the oilfields, from a roughneck on an oil rig to an office job with a major oil company. In 2016, at 63 years old, Tommie came out as a transgender woman to her wife of 42 years. Forced to wrestle with their religious views and face their conservative community, Tommie and "Nancy" attempted to weather this change together--and ultimately were both left fundamentally changed.

India’s teachers are renting out their government jobs, leaving classrooms in the care of low-paid, unqualified substitutes. The illegal but widespread proxy teaching system has jeopardized the future of a generation of children.

6:30 - 7:30pm

Reception:
Join us in the North Gate Hall Courtyard for food and drinks.

7:30 - 9:30pm

Audio

In the aftermath of the Me Too Movement, schools and parents are changing how they talk with their kids and teenagers about consent.

More than 80 percent of people waiting for organ transplants in America are waiting for the same organ: a kidney. But kidneys are the only organ we can transplant from both living and deceased donors. So, how are there still so many people waiting and what can be done to get them the organs they need?

Imagine being scared going to the corner store all because of how your face looked. For many transgender women in the U.S. this is a daily occurrence, and as the number of individuals who identify as transgender increases so does the demand for a gender confirmation surgery called Facial Feminization. This piece looks at two transgender women: one who is considering the surgery and one who got the procedure.

What does a university owe a student who says they’ve been assaulted? And with a Department of Education asking for more court-like procedures, is this format the best way of finding justice?

One in four people in the world use Facebook, but many are fed up with the way it handles user data and privacy. So what alternatives are out there? Explore what it means, and how hard it can be, to unfriend Facebook.