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# School hosts community forum on saving oceans
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/school-hosts-community-forum-on-saving-oceans/
- Published: 2002-11-14T16:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-23T00:55:25.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Education, Santa Monica, #archive-import

*By Daily Press staff*

A community forum is being organized to address the fragile state of the world’s oceans.

Crossroads School, based in Santa Monica, has put together a star-studded panel including a Pulitzer Prize winning author and actor Ted Danson to discuss issues facing our abilities to protect and sustain the oceans.

The event, scheduled for Dec. 4, is a community-based forum that will examine ways the community can sustain our oceans and work for positive changes in environmental policies. A question and answer session with participants including Reef Check, the world’s largest corral reef monitoring agency, will follow. There also will be an exhibit of ocean-inspired pieces by professional and student artists, a special trailer of the new IMAX film “Coral Reef Adventure” and an “Ocean Jazz Extravaganza” featuring Crossroads student musicians.

Dr. Jared Diamond, recipient of the MacArthur Foundation Genius Award, the National Medal of Science and Pulitzer Prize winning author of “Guns, Germs and Steel” and Roger Payne, world renowned scientist and whale expert, will lead a panel discussion of activists, scientists and artists.

Other panelists include Gregor Hodgson, director of Reef Check and UCLA professor; Chad Nelsen, environmental director of Surfrider Foundation; Leslie Ewing, senior coastal engineer of the California Coastal Commission; Michael Hanrahan, president of the Ocean Channel and Joel Reynolds, senior attorney of the natural resources defense council.

Diamond will discuss the importance of ending worldwide whaling. Payne discovered the fact that whales can sing, and he recorded their sounds in his best-selling recording, “Songs of the Humpback Whale.” Environmental activist Ted Danson is the founder of AOC, a national organization that works to achieve clean, swimmable, fishable oceans. Dr. Richard C. Murphy, a world explorer and original colleague of famed oceanographer Jacques Cousteau, also will be part of the discussion.

Ocean Forum is open to the community. The event will begin at 6:30 p.m. at Crossroads School’s community room on the Norton Campus, located at 1715 Olympic Blvd.

On Dec. 3, Crossroads Middle School students will spend the day celebrating the sea, the culmination of a month-long science module devoted to ecology and the oceans.

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/55/9f/559f9abc-8372-4a2e-8c2d-27386da4e363/content/images/2026/10/111402-04_01.jpg)

A panel of experts and environmental activists will gather on Dec. (Photo: Photo courtesy)

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on November 14, 2002.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/111402.pdf?ref=smdp.com)