Coral reefs are likely the most important and enduring marine ecosystem on the planet, with a geologic record stretching back over 540 million years. Today, both corals and reefs are experiencing global degradation. It is the ability of the paleobiologist to peer backward and forward in time that helps us understand the current crisis, affording insight and glimpses into the past, present, and future of corals and reefs. This short course addresses changes, upheavals, and reorganizations or reefs and reef organisms as well as the evolution of scleractinian corals. Authored by a group of international specialists, the volume offers insight into what the future may hold, presenting some common reef themes woven through geologic time.