KSQD-Produced Programming – Cephalopodcasts
Quick listen links: Listen Live – Two-Week Archive
KSQD-produced programs and syndicated shows are listed below in alphabetical order. Click the box with the show name to see more information about each show, including program pages and podcast feeds (if available).
Local News/Talk A-R
Ask Dr. Dawn
Dr. Dawn Motyka discusses health news and research and answers your emails.
Dream Journal
Join us as we explore a range of topics relating to the healing aspects of night time dreams. I talk about my personal dream journey and share what I’ve learned as a dream coach. I interview experienced dreamworkers and others on the path of dreaming, but the heart of this show is YOU, your nighttime dreams, your daytime desires, and your hopes for a better life. Call in, and explore your dreams on the air. Dreams, they really can transform your life. Podcasted episodes available on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Spotify and Stitcher.
Host: Katherine Bell
Exploring Monterey Bay
Exploring Monterey Bay – Program Page
Exploring Monterey Bay is hosted by long-time Santa Cruz resident Mathilde Rand. Mathilde and her guests explore familiar and new places and activities of people in Santa Cruz, Monterey, and San Benito counties.
Host: Mathilde Rand
First Person Singular
First Person Singular segments feature the unique voices of our community, sharing a commentary, personal story, or an observation. To participate, submit 240 words to firstpersonsingular@ksqd.org, which should be readable in 90 seconds. After review, the writer will be invited to record it in KSQD’s production room. The producer then edits in the opening music, an intro and an outro.
Host: Mathilde Rand
From the Bookshelf
From the Bookshelf
Gary Shapiro’s lifetime fascination with pop culture feeds his encyclopedic knowledge of what entertains and captivates the popular imagination. Since the beginning of the millenium he brings you weekly interviews with best-selling authors of fiction and non-fiction, Hollywood biographers, graphic novelists, actors, photographers, and singer-songwriters discussing their works and careers.
From the Bookshelf is broadcast every Wednesday, 6-7pm.
In the Garden
In the Garden presents information on best practices for home gardens, current weather conditions, information on upcoming garden-related events, details regarding assistance needed for community garden projects, and advice from experts guests. Relevant music from all genres as program transitions.
Hosted by: Joe Truskot and Steven E. Popp
Inside Education
KSQD Talks Music
KSQD Talks Music is a podcast stream that features interviews and live performances with the wide variety of musicians who visit our station. From rock to folk, jazz to classical, Santa Cruz is a hub for great live music performances!
Available for subscription on KSQD.org (RSS), YouTube, Apple, Spotify, and TuneIn
Moment of Truth with Ami Chen Mills
Moment of Truth – Program Page
Moment of Truth with Ami Chen Mills addresses the acute crises and opportunities of our day–from an emotional, spiritual and activist perspective. From attacks on democracy to racism and Christo-nationalism … to the climate and extinction crises, Moment of Truth sheds light on humanity’s need for spiritual and emotional growth and a recognition of our interdependence with Earth and on one another. Ami and her team speak with leading political and ecological thinkers and inspired spiritual teachers of our time with an emphasis on the BIPOC and the LGBTQ+ communities and women.
Narrative Species
Narrative Species – Talk of the Bay Fridays
Rick Kleffel has been interviewing authors on his podcast since 2002.
Pride Perspectives
Join KSQD every other Sunday evening at 5, and Tuesday morning at 6, for Pride Perspectives, highlighting the LGBTQ+ community across Santa Cruz County and the Central Coast. Hosts Rob Darrow and Cece Pinheiro keep you up to date on current issues, and share perspectives from the long and rich history of Santa Cruz Pride, marking its 50th anniversary in 2025. Among the features are interviews between young members of the community and elders of the modern Pride movement.
Local News/Talk S-Z
Santa Cruz Naturalist
Santa Cruz Naturalist presents a 3-minute glimpse into organisms and habitats found on California’s central coast. Learn about the unique critters and ecosystems in the area – we hope you’re inspired to go out and see them in person. Our team of naturalists help expand your understanding by sharing their own curiosity and research, and interviewing local experts in the field.
State of Mind
STATE of MIND features intimate conversations about mental health and wellness with psychotherapist Debra Sloss. Our guests share personal stories and hard-earned wisdom from their lived experience accompanied by experts sharing their professional knowledge on important mental health topics. Together we explore the intricacies of being human and living well. Join us for new understandings, seeds of hope, and valuable resources. All episodes available as podcasts on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Pandora & on your smart speaker on TuneIn.
Sustainability Now!
Are you concerned about the Earth’s future? Are you interested in what is being done in the Monterey Bay area to address environmental issues? Do you want to act? Then tune in every other Sunday to “Sustainability Now!” to hear interviews with local scientists, scholars, activists and officials involved in the pursuit of sustainability.
Host: Ronnie D. Lipschutz
Talk of the Bay
Talk of the Bay is committed to covering political, social, and cultural topics from around the Monterey Bay. We focus on current events and people making news locally (from the central coast to Sacramento). We also consider national and international issues, their impact on the central coast, and local responses. We tackle perennial topics like housing, homelessness, transportation, education, and more from a new angle.
HOSTED BY
The Babblery
The Babblery – Program Page
The Babblery features conversations with and about women in the 21st century. In each episode, we explore women’s experiences, discussing how our physical and social gender informs our experiences at work, at home, and in the wider world. Rather than focusing on issues, we focus on lives: working, parenting, playing, voting, advocating, and creating as women.
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Visit The Babblery
The Computer Man Show
Tuesdays from 6-7pm, Luigi Oppido serves as your Computer Man. He presents the latest tech info you can use, and answers calls and questions about PCs, MACs, smart phones, digital hardware and software of all sorts.
Listen to Two-Week Show Archives
The Cutting Edge
Weekly interviews with faculty and other campus researchers at University of California – Santa Cruz. They discuss their most exciting, important research projects, often in connection with a forthcoming public event.
Program hosts include current and retired UCSC faculty members Linda Burman-Hall, Chris Benner, Nada Miljkovic, and Tim Fitzmaurice.
The Hive
A fun and informative gateway into the world of poetry.
The Film Gang
The Film Gang loves nothing more than championing the transformative power of cinema. Join us each week as we discuss cult movies, classics, and current releases available theatrically and streaming.
Hosted by: Paul Kanieski, Maureen O’Connell
The Kitchen Sisters
The Kitchen Sisters Present… Stories from the b-side of history. Lost recordings, hidden worlds, people possessed by a sound, a vision, a mission. The episodes tell deeply layered stories, lush with interviews, field recordings and music. From powerhouse producers The Kitchen Sisters (Hidden Kitchens, The Hidden World of Girls, The Sonic Memorial Project, Lost & Found Sound, Fugitive Waves and coming soon… The Keepers). “The Kitchen Sisters have done some of best radio stories ever broadcast” —Ira Glass. The Kitchen Sisters Present is produced in collaboration with Nathan Dalton and Brandi Howell and mixed by Jim McKee. A proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX.
Hosted by: Nikki Silva
What To Be
“What To Be?” is a weekly program presenting interviews with inspiring people to learn about their careers. If you’ve ever wondered how to become a legal aide, an ethical hacker, or a marine biologist, or what it’s like to run your own business, tune in to “What to Be?”
“What to Be?” was developed by Your Future Is Our Business, whose mission is to provide every Santa Cruz County student with opportunities to discover a fulfilling and successful career.
Prior Shows
Be Bold America!
We have a crisis in politics that can’t be ignored. But! We have a crisis in acceptable character and principle-centered living that can’t be ignored either. Living a bold, principle-centered life? “Be Bold America!” is a live talk show that imagines an America with ethical principles and functional systems. We can be a country with engaged citizens whose lives are politically active and personally meaningful. A bold democratic America first requires informed, principle-centered citizens. On “Be Bold America!” cohosts will set up topics, interview guests, and conclude with reviewing the Keep/Stop/Starts: practical principles and tools to enhance the listeners personal and political life. Every other Sunday at 5:00pm!
Hosted by: Jill Cody & Dr. Pettis Perry
RSS Feed (for use in podcast apps)
Cruz News and Views
Every Wednesday from 3-4 pm, Cruz News & Views presents a roundup of tops stories from local journalists.
Host Nada Milkovich speaks with journalists and editors from our local print and online news media.
Listen to Two-Week Show Archives
Family Sparks
Good News Santa Cruz
Good News Santa Cruz is a show hosted by a collective of women inspired by the peace and social justice mission of WILPF (Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom). There’s 104 years of history behind this show–years of women crossing many nations and facing all kinds of odds to make a world that works better for us all. And this work is still going on, as powerful as ever. Our show brings that story home, here and now, in Santa Cruz, and in real time. We air interviews with local people who are finding real ways out of the mess we’re in–with stories, ideas, successes and strategies connecting across issues to achieve systems change.
Hosts: The Good News Team
On KSQD
Katz on Dogs
I’m here to answer your calls regarding training and behavior questions and host experts from our community and beyond involved with dogs.
Reflections on Buddhism
Reflections on Buddhism is a monthly discussion with local Buddhist teacher Tenzin Chogkyi and Mathew Divaris (host) that bridges the worlds of Buddhist thought, current events and the latest research in the field of positive psychology.
Saturday's Child
The Golden
Unheard Voices
Unheard Voices is a weekly program that aims to create dialogue and raise awareness in the community at large. Each show is hosted by a member of our diverse collective of people from backgrounds under-represented in the media and in power. Unheard Voices looks at historical and current events as well as systemic issues, primarily affecting members of the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) and LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer) communities, but relevant to everyone. Issues range from local to global, and include political, social, cultural, and spiritual topics. Unheard Voices brings to the airwaves new voices for the community to hear.
Hosted By: Gloria Nieto, Ami Chen Mills-Naim, Thairie Ritchie, Bobby Bishop