Theme: Listen to Her

We have curated an event with some of the brightest minds and best talent to give talks and performances. Their content is idea-focused, and covers a wide range of subjects, to foster learning, inspiration and wonder – and provoke conversations that matter.

The theme for TEDxDelthorneWomen is Listen To Her.

Our speakers are from all over the country and committed to engaging in a discussion about the importance of listening to women. Their backgrounds include: Tech entrepreneurs, advertising executives, veterans, nationally syndicated journalists, filmmakers, and immigrants with a passion for advocating for the disenfranchised.

Marriott Redundo Beach/Torrance
3635 Fashion Way
Torrance, California, 90503
United States

Aja McClanahan

Aja McClanahan is a best-selling author, blogger, and writer who covers personal finance and entrepreneurship. Her family's personal story of getting out of over $120,000 in debt has been featured in places like Yahoo! Finance, Kiplinger's, MarketWatch, U.S. News and World Report while her writing has appeared in places such as Inc., Business Insider, MSN Money and dozens of other web outlets. She also manages her daughters' acting careers while living on the South Side of Chicago with her husband.

Alexandra Catalano

Alexandra Catalano is a healthy lifestyle expert, TEDx Speaker, author and creator of the popular lifestyle brand Eat Cute (@eatcute). Alexandra teaches intuitive eating, healthy lifestyle hacks, and self-care practices to enhance daily performance and vitality. Alexandra is a frequent guest on The Hallmark Channel’s Home and Family as well as FOX Good Day LA, CW News, Elite Daily and The Lifetime Network and she has written for publications such as Mindbodygreen, Oxygen Magazine, FOX News Magazine, Paleo Magazine, FabFitFun and Brit +Co.

Chance Cessna

Chance Cessna is an American TV Host, actress, speaker, author and producer from Chicago, IL. She was the youngest child of the three children of a real estate investor father, Gabriel Jackson, and a salon owner mother, Cessna Durr. Chance then began to make her mark on the world of media and broadcast journalism, landing internships with The CW Television Network, WUSA 9 News and celebrity gossip site theYBF.com. In December 2012, she participated in the Miss Illinois USA 2013 pageant and won the pageant's Miss Congeniality 2013 title. Just days after, Chance received an invitation to star in a segment of The Steve Harvey Show which led to a subsequent opportunity to relocate to Los Angeles, CA. Chance is currently a reporter for Essence Magazine and appears as a contributing media personality on several other media outlets. In 2018, Chance will be publishing her first breakout book, Destiny Unstoppable: How To Be Fearless in Pursuit of Your Destiny. She also currently serves as the president and CEO of Christian Women In Entertainment (CWIE). On her free time she loves to travel and serve in her community.

Cristina Garcia

Cristina Garcia has a 15-year track record of service in the non-profit sector, she brings a wealth of knowledge in the areas of program development, community outreach, civic engagement, and policy advocacy. Her work has focused largely on advocating for immigrant justice; she has worked with diverse immigrant communities locally, nationally, and internationally ensuring that immigrant voices are heard, and are part of the decision-making process at every level in our democracy. Cristina has worked in transnational advocacy where she has been immersed in matters of human mobility and forced migration from an analytical perspective as well as a hands-on approach. Cristina is the granddaughter of Bracero migrant workers, and the daughter of Mexican immigrants. She holds Master’s degree from the University of Chicago's School of Social Service Administration and a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from Robert Morris University. Cristina is a 2015 fellow of the American Express Aspen Leadership Academy and an alumni of the Latino Policy Forum’s Nonprofit Leadership Program in 2013.

Dana Commandatore

Dana Commandatore is a full-time working wife, mother, advocate, and baker. She grew up in New Jersey and moved across the river to New York City to start her advertising career in the late 1990s. She and her husband, actor Michael Broderick, decided to move their family to Los Angeles in 2004 where their son was diagnosed with autism. She and Michael began RethinkingAutism.com in 2009 to change the autism conversation from causation and cure to acceptance and understanding. Dana and her family still reside in Los Angeles where she is an Executive Vice President at Deutsch Advertising Agency, Autism Acceptance Advocate and avid baker.

Fay Hauser-Price

FAY HAUSER-PRICE, actress, producer, director, songwriter, artist, and mother, has amassed over 20 years of credits while striving for personal excellence in the entertainment industry.

Louise Mbella

Louise Mbella “Sinai” also called (Frenchy) is a Native of the City of Créteil in France born and raised. She is a proud immigrant of Los Angeles where she advocates for Homeless Rights, Human Rights, Social Projects fostering Equality, Diversity, Inclusion, Empowerment and more. With a French Degree in Economics and Social Sciences, and a Certificate in The Humanities from a U.S academic institution, her advocacy work on behalf of the homeless in Downtown Los Angeles, particularly Skidrow, is significant. Having overcome trauma homelessness and oppression herself, she highlights the importance of listening to the voices of survivors particularly those experiencing homelessness, scarcity, violence. She feels that making them part of the conversation and solutions of our social issues directly impacting them is important. Her message suggests the necessity to go beyond just providing shelters and low income permanent supportive housing as an answer to the homeless crisis. She stresses the importance of creating social curriculum platforms while transforming the minds of men and women, as a fundamental element for helping end homelessness.

Lyvonne "Proverbs" Picou

Wellness Activist

Minister Lyvonne “Proverbs” Picou, a New York City native, is a preacher, transformational speaker, poet, educator, and creative social entrepreneur. She is the founder of beautiful scars (@WereSurthrivors), a boutique storytelling agency focused on trauma, healing, and resiliency. beautiful scars, the online platform, is for Black Christian women who are also survivors of childhood sexual abuse and/or male sexual violence.

Martine Kalaw

Martine Kalaw is an author, speaker and spokeswoman on current immigration laws and reform. Her book "Illegal Among Us" (Nov. 2018) recounts her journey through a 7- year deportation battle with no family or country, to success as a senior level executive with an advanced degree, a father she thought dead, and finally her long-sought U.S. citizenship. Martine was a Huffington Post contributor on the topic of Immigration Reform . She is a graduate of Hamilton College and Syracuse University with a Masters in Public Administration and Immigration Law. She is an Organizational Development consultant with over 8 years of designing professional/ management training and building organizational development strategies for fortune 500 companies and technology start-ups on a global level.

Reaa Puri

Reaa Puri is an award-winning filmmaker, activist, and co-founder of Breaktide Productions, a women-of-color-owned production company. She has won numerous international film awards from New York to China and London, and was selected as a Sundance New Voices Lab semifinalist. Reaa’s credits include being a published photographer in Vogue Magazine, Vh1 Showrunner, and Video Producer at Wear Your Voice Magazine, Carbonated TV, and Hearst Digital Media. Her original work frequently explores gender-based violence, accessibility and holistic wellness. Reaa earned her bachelor’s degree in film from the University of California, Berkeley, and grew up between California, India, and Kuwait, which influenced her decision to intersect media with social justice.

Roberta Hoskie

Before her incredible story went viral, Roberta Hoskie committed her life to helping educate others about their financial well-being and purpose. Hoskie was born and raised in New Haven, Connecticut. Though she became pregnant at the age of 17, she was determined not to live a life of poverty. After obtaining her associate degree in office administration at Gateway Community and Technical College, she worked at Yale University in the Department of Pediatrics. In 2002, she left Yale University and accepted a position in Bronx, NY as a departmental administrator at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. She later studied business management at Quinnipiac University. As the Founder and CEO of the Outreach School of Real Estate, Hoskie has dedicated herself to educating others on how to end the cycle of poverty. Outreach School of Real Estate is an educational facility designed to prepare students for the real estate world. Mrs. Hoskie's first real estate deal made her over a quarter of a million dollars and dramatically changed her life. She is currently the President and CEO of Outreach Realty Services, a full service Real Estate Brokerage.

Sarita Jackson

Sarita D. Jackson, Ph.D. is a global trade consultant, author, scholar, and speaker. Dr. Jackson encourages global trade policies and company practices that put global citizen welfare over economic growth and business bottom line. Dr. Jackson’s passion and efforts have been inspired by her experiences living and working in the Southern African, Latin American, and Caribbean regions. She has earned the Fulbright Scholar Award (Dominican Republic); SCORE Greater Los Angeles Certificate of Entrepreneurship; and effective teaching awards from two different universities, with the most recent from UCLA Extension. She was also nominated for the 2017 Los Angeles Business Journal Women’s Award, which recognizes the achievements of women leaders in the business community. Dr. Jackson carries out her mission as the founder, president and CEO of the Los Angeles-based research and consulting firm, Global Research Institute of International Trade.

Sonali Fiske

Sonali Fiske is a Sri Lankan-American women's leadership coach and founder of Pick Your Platform & Raise Your Voice. As a mentor to underrepresented & woman-identifying voices of color, she centers the often suppressed and sidelined stories of those still considered on the margins of society. Her recent online masterclass on "Dismantling White Dominance in Women's Entrepreneurship" went viral, and centered the stories of black, indigenous women of color countering the current narrative in leadership and influence. She also leads storytelling workshops and self-care retreats locally and internationally, and conducts a monthly tele-call entitled "Call to Sacred Activism for women leaders" confronting uneasy issues such as cultural appropriation, tokenism, and white supremacy. And in her leisure time, she works on her first anthology of poetry for brown women. Sonali is also currently a council member of the International Council of Interfaith & Indigenous Women. You can find our more about her work at: www.sonalifiske.com.

Stella McShera

Stella is an innovator and serial entrepreneur that has supported the growth and success of women for close to two decades. She founded the first business incubator in the U.S. focused on fashion that provided resources to hundreds of female entrepreneurs. She went on to become the COO of a small beauty business that she transformed to a multi-million-dollar company with a "people then profits" strategy. Her work earned her recognition from the Oregon Business Magazine and Women’s Inc. as one of “Six Women Innovators to watch” and the Portland Business Journal as one of the “Top 100 fastest growing companies in Oregon” award. In 2015, Stella created equallet (equality + wallet) a local search platform that empowers conscious consumers and social impact investors to find and do business with women. It's mission is to close the gender gap, one transaction at a time.

Three Daughters Music

Ashley-Kate-Kacey are moms who love Jesus and making music.

Toya Webb

Toya Webb is a national award-winning CMO, transformational life coach and motivational speaker. She inspires her clients to live a life with purpose on purpose. Born and raised on the south side of Chicago, this former news reporter has a knack for good story-telling and a passion for people. She is a recipient of the YWCA leadership award in Communications and Technology, was named one of the Best Under 40 by the Kane County Chronicle and was recognized as a mover and a shaker as a 40 under 40 honoree by the American Association for Women in Community Colleges. An executive and influential leader in higher education, Toya believes in the power of lifelong learning and is currently pursuing a doctorate in Higher Education and Organizational Change at Benedictine University in Illinois. She is married to her high school sweetheart and has three sons.