Theme: This Changes Everything

Imagine spending the day with hundreds of smart friends, conversing, watching engaging talks and riveting performances, being both inspired and challenged. Our 2015 theme, "This Changes Everything," is dedicated to those daring enough to dream, the entrepreneurs, educators, and changemakers who reject the status quo and apply new, innovative solutions to the problems facing modern society, whether it is a new way of thinking and addressing issues or technological invention.

Community Center Theater
1301 L Street
Sacramento, California, 95814
United States

AirAligned

More than ten years ago, Tresa Honaker formed AirAligned Aerial Dance Group. Unlike traditional circus performers, AirAligned members are high-level athletes, who are formally trained dancers, acrobats and martial artists, using trapeze, lyra, bungee, straps and aerial fabric in their performances. The group has received additional training in the aerial arts from Ingrid Hoffman, Hollywood Aerial Arts and Cirque LA in Los Angeles, Trapeze Arts in Oakland and San Francisco Circus Center. AirAligned performs for a variety of audiences offering solo acts, duets and trios as well as dynamic full-length group productions.

Capital Dance Project

Capital Dance Project is a collaboration of local artists, working to elevate the spirit of the community through the performing arts. Founded by professional dancers of the Sacramento Ballet, the Capital Dance Project is the realization of a shared dream to create a dancer-run company that inspires the community throughout the summer season. Though not the start they would have hoped for, events catapulted this dream into reality in early 2015. In just 20 days, the dancers formed Capital Dance Project with local non-profit "Concerts 4 Charity", secured the Crest Theatre, recruited local visual artists, musicians and sponsors, and debuted their inaugural show, "Behind the Barre,” to rave reviews. www.capitaldanceproject.org

Adrian Bellue

After a serious injury left him unable to practice martial arts, artist Adrian Bellue picked up his acoustic guitar inspiring him to live his life exploring the endless possibilities of music and the guitar while sharing his inspiration on stage. Co-producing his first album with producer Brian Lee Bender, Adrian has performed across the West Coast and beyond with his modern approach to acoustic fingerstyle guitar. Adrian has shared the stage with world-renowned guitarists, such as Andy McKee, Antoine Dufour, and Craig D’Andrea, and he has been complemented by guitar masters, including John Doan, Thomas Leeb, and Don Ross.

Alexander Dervin

What do legendary director Steven Spielberg, muralist and graffiti artist David Choe, and creative Renaissance man Kanye West all have in common? They have all called on Alexander Dervin to produce visual sequences for their wildly diverse creative projects. Dervin’s early success with commercials, title sequences, and visual effects with notable creatives paved the way for longer form opportunities in documentaries, feature films and series. Some projects include: Argo, Superman Returns, Across the Universe, Tron and Minority Report. Dervin and producing partner Kurt Mattila founded the Hollywood-based production company Weiward where they produce original and experimental works.

Amber Stott

Amber K. Stott is founder and chief food genius of the nonprofit Food Literacy Center, inspiring kids to eat their veggies. She's the creator of the statewide Food Literacy Month resolution, is a freelance food writer and a steering committee member for America’s Farm-to-Fork Capital. She's been named a “Food Revolution Hero” by the Jamie Oliver Food Foundation and one of Food Tank’s 20 Innovators Protecting the Planet.

Braimah Apambire

Dr. Braimah Apambire’s early life experiences in Northern Ghana walking long distances to fetch water no doubt impacts his current work as a water, sanitation & hygiene (WASH) and development expert. Throughout his international and domestic work, he has extensive experience integrating WASH activities into other developmental sectors. Currently, he serves as the Director of the Center for International Water and Sustainability (CIWAS) at the Desert Research Institute (DRI) in Reno, Nevada. Prior to this, Dr. Apambire served as the Director of the WASH Sector at World Vision U.S. Dr. Apambire received his B.S. from the University of Ghana, his M.S. from Carleton University, Canada and his Ph.D. from the University of Nevada, Reno.

Clay Nutting

Clay Nutting is passionate about promoting arts and entertainment in Sacramento. He is a restaurateur, founder/director of Concerts for Charity, and generally a massive cultural force in Sacramento bringing a diverse range of events from TBD Fest and the Sacramento Electronic Music Festival to Ballet + Indie Music and THIS.

Edward Damiano

Every parent has a dream for his or her child. Dr. Edward Damiano’s dream for his son David is that can live a life unhindered by his type 1 diabetes diagnosis. As a Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Boston University, Dr. Damiano has worked toward this dream by developing a bionic pancreas – a technology he hopes is available for his son when he heads to college in the fall of 2017. Over the next few years, Dr. Damiano aims to conduct the final pivotal trial testing a fully integrated version of the device and to receive regulatory approval making this device broadly available.

Ernesto Sirolli

Ernesto Sirolli is a noted authority in the field of sustainable economic development and is the Founder of the Sirolli Institute, an international non-profit organization that teaches community leaders how to establish and maintain Enterprise Facilitation projects in their community. The Institute is now training communities in the USA, Canada, Australia, England and Scotland. In 1985, he pioneered in Esperance, a small rural community in Western Australia, a unique economic development approach based on harnessing the passion, determination, intelligence, and resourcefulness of the local people. The striking results of "The Esperance Experience" have prompted more than 250 communities around the world to adopt responsive, person-centered approaches to local economic development similar to the Enterprise Facilitation® model pioneered in Esperance.

Judy Robinett

Judy Robinett has made a name for herself as a leader in the public and private sectors. She led numerous companies as CEO, served in management positions at Fortune 500 companies, and held a faculty position within the Goldman Sachs’ 10,000 Small Business Program. Currently, she serves on the advisory boards of Illuminate VC, Pereg VC, Springboard Enterprises, WIM and Newpark Capital. Judy’s recently published book, How to Be a Power Connector: The 5+50+150 Rule for Turning Your Business Network into Profits, has gained national attention. Inc. Magazine ranked it as the #1 business book of 2014.

Julie Lein

Julie Lein is the Co-Founder and President of Tumml, a non-profit, urban ventures accelerator based in San Francisco that empowers entrepreneurs to solve urban problems. During the last two years, the organization has supported over 65 entrepreneurs from 23 startups, and collectively it has created hundreds of new community jobs, raised $25 million in follow-on funding, and launched products and services for over 2.2 million city residents. Tumml has been recognized as “The Next Urban Innovation” by the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City and named “Best Startup” by the San Francisco Business Times. Julie has an M.B.A. from MIT Sloan and a B.A. from Stanford University.

Karla Nelson

Karla Nelson is passionate about empowering small businesses to succeed. Having successfully launching several companies herself, she uses her skills and connections to help other entrepreneurs following their dreams. Some of Karla’s current projects include Sac-SESS, Latch.com, and Swiss Avenue Partners.

Renée Mitchell

Renée J. Mitchell is a police sergeant with sixteen years of experience at the Sacramento Police Department. She holds multiple advanced degrees, and uses an academic approach to improve policing. She has designed and implemented surveys and field trials to help advance evidence-based practices to a variety of policing disciplines. Renée gave her first TEDx talk at TEDxOxbridge in 2013.

Thomas Dodson

He’s covered raging hurricanes, flown on Air Force relief missions to Honduras, and lived in a treehouse community in the jungles of Costa Rica, but Thomas Dodson’s most jaw-dropping experience was when he learned what life is really like for children online. Thomas is a father, and a digital marketing and social media consultant for Southwestern Consulting. With more than a million social media impressions in his network each day, Thomas thought he got it. He assumed he understood the challenges, dangers, and issues young people face in their digital lives. That is, until he asked them. As Co-founder of the nonprofit Above The Fray, Thomas now speaks to parent groups across the country, educating moms and dads about what their kids are doing when they’re buried in their phones, glued to their laptops, and immersed in their gaming consoles.

Tre Borden

Tre Borden seeks out collaborative projects based in the visual arts, fashion, hospitality and entertainment industries using entrepreneurial skills to promote artists and bring art to the community. With a pedigree that includes Yale College, New York Magazine, Oscar De La Renta, DIESEL, and UC Davis Graduate School of Management, Tre has help realize many exciting projects. Notable collaborations include Tapigami, Exhibit S, Flywheel, Bright Underbelly, and Portal.