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Monday - Sunday: 9:30 AM - 5:00 PM

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Evening Tide Talks

2023-2024 Guest Speaker Series

Evening Tide Talks is a complimentary lecture series featuring expert scientists and world explorers at The Florida Aquarium, presented by Wells Fargo. Each lecture takes place from 6:15 to 8:00pm at The Florida Aquarium  (doors open at 5:45pm) and includes a live presentation and Q&A session.

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Kymbriell Finch

Water Safety + Drowning Prevention Specialist

Diving Into Your Purpose
Wednesday, March 27, 2024
Complimentary reception at 5:45pm | Talk begins at 6:15pm
Vinik Room – The Florida Aquarium

Since 2010, Kymbriell has dedicated her passions & voice to cultivating opportunities within the Greater Tampa Bay Area that provide accessible and affordable year-round swim lessons and aquatic experiences.

She has participated in opportunities to teach many students how to swim, coach Special Olympics, travel worldwide lifeguarding abroad on Disney Cruise Line ships, create a decorative collection of water certificates and produce an educational water safety and drowning prevention program. When not in the water, she is heavily involved with local youth-led initiatives and advocates for equal aquatic resources to serve underrepresented communities better.

Kymbriell Finch is the founder and CEO of Courageous Leap Incorporated. Through swim lessons and partnerships, Courageous Leap Inc. aims to mold confident swimmers while plugging students into experimental aquatic opportunities that will inspire and shift their perception. More than 70 percent of the world is made of water and the amount of water in the human body is nearly 75%. As students are connected to aquatic skill practices and diverse learning opportunities, they will learn to reconnect with life before fear.

Courageous Leap Inc. aspires to unite with advocates who believe that no box limits or defines what we are capable of. By partnering with local and nationwide organizations, we will collaborate to shift the mindset of our youth and communities by prioritizing self-confidence and the power of believing in oneself. The outcome will not only be individuals who are water-smart and well-equipped to survive and protect others in aquatic spaces, but our students will also have the capability to be courageous and audacious when it comes to achieving all of their desires.

 

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Coming Soon

Dave Bader

Chief Operations and Education Officer, Marine Mammal Care Center

Lessons Learned in Vaquita ConservationDave Bader, Chief Operations and Education Officer of Marine Mammal Care Center in Los Angeles California
Wednesday, April 17, 2024
Complimentary reception at 5:45pm | Talk begins at 6:15pm
Vinik Room – The Florida Aquarium

Dave Bader serves as MMCC’s Chief Operations and Education Officer. In this capacity, he helps support the general operations of MMCC as well as helping to design and manage MMCC’s educational programming. Dave has a bachelor’s degree in Marine Biology from the University of California at Santa Cruz and a master’s degree in Biology with an emphasis in educational media design from the University of California at Irvine. Over the past 20-plus years, Dave has created a suite of capacity-building opportunities for staff, university and agency scientists, and informal science educators throughout the Los Angeles area. Dave also serves as the Media and Stakeholder Engagement Liaison for the IUCN’s Integrated Conservation Planning for Cetaceans (ICPC) working group. With ICPC, Dave is working to support the conservation of marine mammals internationally with a focus on critically endangered species such as the vaquita porpoise.

In 2015, there were only 100 vaquita left in the world, and most people had never heard of the vaquita. People needed to know about what was going on so they could do something to stop extinction from happening. At this time, I joined a team of passionate conservationists to try and prevent the decline of vaquita populations and ensure that everyone knew the vaquita’s plight. Over the last 8 years, I have learned that it is not just the vaquita that is on the brink of extinction. Small coastal cetaceans (dolphins and porpoises) worldwide are in decline, and gill net fishing is primarily to blame. While the problem seems simple, the reality is far from it. People at the heart of the problem, the fishers and community stakeholders, are critical to conservation success and are unfortunately rarely at the heart of conservation solutions.

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