In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized (subject to certain rules and regulations).

Science Gallery, Dublin
Naughton Institute, Pearse Street
Trinity College, Dublin 2
Dublin, Dublin, Dublin 2
Ireland

Emily Logan

Emily is the first Chief Commissioner of the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission appointed by President Michael D Higgins on 31 October 2014. In the decade prior to her appointment, Ms Logan served as Ireland’s first Ombudsman for Children, accounting directly to the Oireachtas. Key areas of interest during her tenure included: multi-agency review of child death; own-volition systemic investigation into state compliance with child protection policy; she has progressed the rights of children without parental care, in particular children in care, separated children and children deprived of their liberty; since her first year in Office Ms Logan has championed for an amendment to the Irish Constitution to further enhance the rights of children. In 2008, she was appointed by her peers to the position of President of the European Network of Ombudsmen for Children, a network of 40 Ombudsman for Children Offices across Europe and remained on the executive until September 2011.

Fiona Collins

Fiona is the Principal of an inner city school in Dublin.Her interest in empowering young people began with the establishment of one of the first student councils in an Irish primary school. Under her leadership , her school was elected as an Ashoka Changemaker School-part of the first cohort of Changemaker Schools in Ireland. With her dedicated team of teachers and parents, Fiona is committed in exploring ways to promote educational participation, social inclusion and responsive citizenship. Addressing the inequalities faced by young people in marginalised communities lead Fiona to develop an ’empathy based methodology’ programme in her school. This programme has proven to be very successful in enhancing school readiness and building resilience amongst children in primary school.

Katie McAnena

Katie has been competing in windsurfing in the discipline of wave-sailing for 8 years. She is 5 times Irish ladies champion. Katie also competes on the American Windsurfing Tour and had her first contest win on that tour this February in Cabo Verde which puts her as being ranked no.1 in the USA currently. In 2013 Katie became the first woman in the world to windsurf the world-famous big wave spot of Jaws on the island of Maui, Hawaii. In addition Katie is currently ranked no.1 for ladies SUP surfing and for the technical class of SUP racing. She also represented Ireland at the world championships in Peru for SUP surfing in 2013. Katie qualified as a doctor in 2011 and is currently working in Sligo General Hospital.

Keren Jackson

Keren first began withdrawing from society at the age of 12, eventually leaving school at 15. She is now a Social Entrepreneur working to create social integration among ethnic and cultural groups in Dublin. It was her first hand experience of social exclusion and racism abroad that helped her realise her passion; ethnic and socio-cultural integration. Personal experience vividly demonstrated the negative impact social exclusion has on the level of engagement of young people in society and the development rate of individuals who experience it. Keren realised that something needed to be done to ensure others in Ireland didn’t experience what she had experienced abroad and knew the time to act is now. In May 2013 she founded BlueFire, a social enterprise that uses Social and Artistic events as a means to integrate the vast array of cultures now present in Ireland. With the support of her team, BlueFire has since reached over 13,000 people and continues to grow.

Nathan McDonagh

Nathan is 17 years old and has just finished his time in Secondary School. A self professed geek with a love of comic books, punk rock, science fiction and many elements of geek culture, Nathan feels very strongly about the sexism found towards women within geek culture and sets about changing the way women are viewed at TEDx Youth@TheSpire. Over the last two years Nathan has immersed himself in discussing and advocating on a wide range of social issues on a number of different platforms and events. Some of these issues included; mental health, education reform, climate change, stresses for teens, future planing and safeguarding for children and bullying. He has been given the opportunity and support to discuss and debate on such topics through his school CBS Synge Street, UNICEF and Future Voices Ireland. Nathan is a member of the St.John Ambulance Brigade.

Patrick Boland

Patrick has worked as a consultant, executive coach and educator since 2004 in organisations ranging from Gonzaga College to Trinity College Dublin, Deloitte to Diageo. He has served on senior leadership teams in the not-for-profit sector and worked in human capital and strategy consulting. Patrick’s work at Conexus helps organisations to bridge the generation gap between high potentials and their leaders, creating communication, engagement and high performance in the workplace. His particular expertise lies in the areas of Generation Y (millennial) coaching, senior team coaching and conflict resolution. In addition, through his role as consultant with the Authentic Leadership Institute, Patrick facilitates senior leaders to discover their deeper purpose and find the courage to live it through coaching and leadership development programmes. Patrick is a member of the Association for Coaching in Ireland and the British Psychological Society in the UK.

Rory O'Carroll

Rory is a footballer and hurler with Dublin and Kilmacud Crokes. He is a full back on the Dublin team. O’Carroll holds four All-Ireland medals. In 2009, he won an All-Ireland Senior Club Football Championship winners medal with Kilmacud Crokes and in 2010, he won the All-Ireland Under 21 Football Championship with Dublin. He has won the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship twice with Dublin in 2011 and again in 2015. O’Carroll has a degree in French and History from UCD and recently completed another degree in social work. Rory has spoken out on the impact of concussion on sports professionals.

Sinead Burke

Sinead Burke

Sinead is currently a PhD Student within the School of Education in Trinity College, Dublin. Her area of research is student voice and authentically listening to primary school children in terms of what they learn, how they learn and the legislation that affects them. Previously, Sinéad has worked as a primary school teacher and as a broadcaster on national and local airwaves. She is the Alternative Miss Ireland emeritus, an ambassador the ISPCC Anti-bullying Shield Campaign and documents the lives of some of the country’s most intriguing and empowering people on her blog, ‘MinniMélange’. Further Information can be found at minniemelange.com

Sinead 2 Burke

Sophie Healy-Thow

Sophie is a seventeen year old school girl from Cork in Ireland who already has an impressive international track record for creating awareness about food security, particularly amongst young people. Sophie cares passionately about this issue and was named as one of Time magazine’s Top 20 most inspirational teens of 2014. She has presented a number of television programmes on food security and other science topics, including Two Tube and Swipe TV for RTE. Sophie is a regular speaker and panelists at conferences and events including We Day UK, Thought For Food Challenge, UN Year of the Soil, the Web Summit and EXCITED.ie. Her interest in science and food security was sparked when she won her first science award at the age of twelve. Since then, along with two team mates she was a winner of the Google Science Fair 2014, European Union Young Scientist BT Young Contest 2013 and the BT Young Scientist & Technology Exhibition 2013.

Tom Curran

Tom is the partner of Marie Fleming, the right to die campaigner who took their case to the Irish Supreme Court before Marie passed away. Tom is a long term campaigner on the matter and is now preparing to introduce legislation on assisted dying with the support of TDs.