Theme: Zoom Out

Each year, our event has a theme curated by the TEDxUCIrvine team. This year's theme is:

"Zoom Out"

The theme is intentionally vague to include a wide array of talks. “Zoom Out” is a play on words that references the Zoom video conferencing platform, popularized in 2020, but can be interpreted as a moment of reflection on one’s past experiences or insight into a different perspective. Within this ongoing pandemic, it is easy to get stuck in the monotony of our day to day agenda; in order to break out of this cycle and pivot onto the next move, goal or journey, we must first start to “zoom out” and look at the bigger picture. The overarching theme of “Zoom Out” is to encompass one’s journey of successes and failures, either from the past or present, and suggest a new perspective/view to the audience as a story. So tell us, how do you “Zoom Out”?

UC Irvine
92697
Irvine, California, TBD
United States

Angela Ye Jin Shin

Ocular Disease Evaluator

Angela Ye Jin Shin is a first generation Korean American immigrant that has graduated from the University of California, Riverside with a Bachelor of Science in Neuroscience as the top 4% of her graduating class. Currently, she works as an Ocular Disease Evaluator at the Doheny Eye Institute/UCLA Stein Eye Institute for ocular disease research and has published many of her works in the National Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology Journal. She is fluent in 3 languages: English, Korean, and Spanish and is learning her fourth: ASL; her drive to learn many languages and her love for communication stemmed from her personal background as a Korean translator for her family. Angela uses her experience as a first generation Korean American immigrant woman in STEM to shape and influence many others to look back and learn from their own cultural background as they navigate and pursue the American dream.

David Pincus

Professor + author

J. David Pincus, Ph.D., and Richard J. Knapp have been best friends since high school after discovering they had each lost their mothers to suicide a few years before. After attending the University of Maryland as undergrads, Rick moved to The Ohio State University for his Master's (journalism) while David returned to U of Maryland for his Masters and Ph.D. (organizational communication). Their professional lives took them in different directions, Rick becoming a management consultant and David a college professor. As they neared retirement, they locked arms in writing and publishing a book about their life-long experiences as survivors of suicide loss and the lessons they learned -- Sons of Suicide: A Memoir of Friendship.

Portia Jackson Preston

Assistant Professor

Dr. Portia Jackson Preston started her garden with the support of Organic Harvest Gardens, a local black-owned mini-farm, to create a healing space for herself as she supported others. Along the way, she learned important lessons about how to navigate challenging times with resilience. Dr. Jackson Preston is an Assistant Professor of Public Health at California State University, Fullerton, where she teaches courses on stress management, promoting health in diverse populations, and public health administration. Her research focuses on multilevel approaches to self-care, and stress as a driver of health inequity. Her current projects examine the relationship between mindful self-care, stress, and measures of physical and mental well-being. Dr. Jackson Preston works with organizations to create policies, practices, and procedures that prioritize well-being and sustainable performance.

Richard Knapp

Strategy Committee Chair of Cleveland Play House + author

J. David Pincus, Ph.D., and Richard J. Knapp have been best friends since high school after discovering they had each lost their mothers to suicide a few years before. After attending the University of Maryland as undergrads, Rick moved to The Ohio State University for his Master's (journalism) while David returned to U of Maryland for his Masters and Ph.D. (organizational communication). Their professional lives took them in different directions, Rick becoming a management consultant and David a college professor. As they neared retirement, they locked arms in writing and publishing a book about their life-long experiences as survivors of suicide loss and the lessons they learned -- Sons of Suicide: A Memoir of Friendship.

Shahrdad Lotfipour

Assistant Professor

Through a Fulbright Fellowship in Australia, I became fascinated by neurobiology and addiction. This led to graduate studies at the Transdisciplinary Tobacco Use Research Center of UC Irvine, 1 of 7 NIH funded centers in the U.S. aimed at fighting the tobacco addiction pandemic. I then studied at the Brain and Body Center at the University of Nottingham, the Hatos Center for Neuropharmacology at UCLA, and finally back to UCI as a tenure-track Assistant Professor in the Departments of Emergency Medicine, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. My research studies focus on the mechanisms of adolescent drug addiction, mechanisms and consequences of maternal nicotine exposure on adolescent substance use, gut-brain interactions in opioid use, the role of other constituents in tobacco smoke that interact with nicotine to mediate tobacco addiction, genetic and epigenetic mechanisms mediating drug addiction, and therapeutic interventions that could help with drug cessation.

Tomiqua Perry

Public Speaker/Blogger/Podcast Host-I Am Miq

I am a visual artist, poet, and jewelry designer, and have spent the last 15 years teaching other artists, entertainers, and small business owners to brand their craft so they can live off of what they are passionate about too. My experience with the business of creativity led me to work in progressive politics, promoting particular political issues or candidates using a similar process. I found myself enlightening people on what it means to live as a person of color, leveraging my experiences growing up as biracial and navigating perceptions from both of my races my whole life. I believe it is up to all of us to want to learn about the experiences of others as a way to spark lasting change, but it takes more than one person to have a conversation. Difficult questions need to be asked and then answered with the intention to impact people enough to want to spark a strong desire to advocate for the many versions of the human experience.