Washington state is growing in terms of population and budget, but the number of reporters covering politics in Olympia, its state capital, has declined. And according to Northwest News Network political correspondent Austin Jenkins, “state houses are the incubators” for national public policy. He shares his brief but spectacular take on being "overwhelmed" in order to keep viewers informed.

Dr. Jedidah Isler has an unusual job: she studies supermassive black holes in space (they're called blazars). She’s also one of the few black women in astrophysics and is trying to change that. Dr. Isler, Assistant Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Dartmouth College, shares her brief but spectacular take on why inclusivity is so important in science, technology, engineering and math.

Writing shaped Ashley Ford's life since childhood, when she confided secrets to her journal and clung to the emotional letters her father sent from prison, where he was serving a 30-year sentence for rape. Now a professional writer, Ford offers her brief but spectacular take on striving to become “a person who forgives.”

What’s the value of asking questions to which we don’t know the answer? Poet Franny Choi’s “Introduction to Quantum Theory” does just that, and she calls it “one of the scariest things” she’s ever written. Choi offers her brief but spectacular take on imagining alternate realities.