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).

655 Knight Way
Stanford University
Stanford, California, 94305
United States

Ben Franta

Benjamin Franta is a JD-PhD Candidate at Stanford Law School and the Stanford Department of History, where he studies the history of fossil fuel producers and climate change politics. He holds a separate PhD in applied physics from Harvard University, is a former research fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government, and helped to organize Harvard’s internationally-known fossil fuel divestment campaign. He has served as a consulting expert for climate change litigation, and his research and writing have appeared in Nature Climate Change, The Guardian, Project Syndicate, and elsewhere, translated into 10 languages, and cited in the US Congressional Record.

Jessica Pointing

Jessica Pointing is pursuing her PhD in Physics at the University of Oxford specialising in quantum computing, and previously was a PhD student in Computer Science at Stanford University as a Knight-Hennessy Scholar. She received her bachelor's degree in Physics and Computer Science at Harvard University with high honors as a John Harvard Scholar, after being a bachelors student at MIT. Jessica was selected for Forbes 30 under 30 in Science and was selected to be the council fellow for the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Quantum Applications. She has interned as a quantum researcher at KBR at NASA Ames Research Center, software engineer at Google, management consultant at McKinsey and Company, investment banker at Goldman Sachs, and strategist at Morgan Stanley. Jessica founded the Stanford Quantum Computing Association and the Harvard College Quantum Computing Association. She won the IBM Q Quantum Computing Award for winning, with a team, IBM's first quantum computing hackathon. She was also a prize-winner at the Creative Destruction Lab quantum computing hackathon. She has been awarded the McKinsey Women's Impact Award and has been named a Google Anita Borg Scholar. She has also won scholarships from Microsoft, Palantir, Adobe Research, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Neo, Society of Women Engineers Scholar and Society of Geophysicists.

Jiang Peicun

Jiang Peicun is passionate about bringing joy to people. He graduated in 2020 from Stanford University, where he taught and performed improvisation. Professionally, he’s experienced a variety of roles such as a sports presenter, a teacher, and a chef. He is presently a product manager at Salesforce, where he tirelessly champions the connection between improvisation and product management.

Mary Zhu

Mary Zhu is a student studying Computer Science for her B.S. and M.S. at Stanford. She founded her first nonprofit in high school by selling cakes to sponsor children in underserved communities. She is now the co-founder of Develop for Good, which connects volunteer engineers and designers to technical projects at nonprofits.

Nari Gathers

Nariman Gathers is neuroatypical. They map their diagnosis closest to that of Autism Spectrum Disorder, and sometimes they even see sounds. They spend their time as a designer turning everyday neuroatypical strategies into steps that help neurotypical folks do community better.

Rowan Mockler

Rowan is a senior at Stanford majoring in Computer Science with a focus on human-computer interaction. Born and raised in South Africa, Rowan aspires to combine his interests in education technology and consumer software with his passion for education equality to drive positive change in education systems through technology.