You're not alone in the overwhelming sum that you carry with you. Explore what it means to be a university student in this era of massive debt, and the low-cost alternatives to battling this reality.

In the fall of 2011 Peter Norvig taught a class with Sebastian Thrun on artificial intelligence at Stanford attended by 175 students in situ -- and over 100,000 via an interactive webcast. He shares what he learned about teaching to a global classroom.

Between 2020 and 2022, The National Center for Educational Statistics reported the largest average decline in reading scores since 1990, and the first ever drop in math. How can we reverse these current trends and improve student outcomes? Brian Johnson, a former teacher turned consultant, has designated three focus areas that can help educators...

Tim Brown is the CEO of the "innovation and design" firm IDEO -- taking an approach to design that digs deeper than the surface.

"Once upon a time in America," says professor Sajay Samuel, "going to college did not mean graduating with debt." Today, higher education has become a consumer product -- costs have skyrocketed, saddling students with a combined debt of over $1 trillion, while universities and loan companies make massive profits. Samuel proposes a radical soluti...

In 1943, Allied aircraft rained tens of thousands of leaflets on Nazi Germany below. The leaflets urged readers to renounce Hitler, to fight furiously for the future— and to never give up hope. Their call to action rippled through homes and businesses— and their message even reached concentration camps. They were signed: the White Rose. Iseult G...

Student Ludwick Marishane invented a water-less bathing lotion and was named the 2011 Global Student Entrepreneur of the Year Award -- all because he didn't feel like taking baths.

High school newspaper editors Neha Madhira and Haley Stack share how they fought back when their critical journalism faced the threat of censorship. Learn more about how their efforts expanded to lobbying for New Voices, a law which would extend First Amendment protections to student journalism, and which has now passed in multiple states.

We tend to think of evolution as a slow, gradual process playing out over millions of years. But evolutionary biologist Shane Campbell-Staton says nature is now changing at breakneck speed to keep up with the world humanity has built. From tuskless elephants who escape poachers to wolves living in the radioactive Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, Campbe...

Here's what can happen when we bring education online ... and open it up to anyone.

What do you envision when you hear the word 'student-athlete'? Law student and long-jump champion Kendall Spencer suspects that the average response to that question might not do student-athletes justice. Having been told--like many other athletes--to stick to what he's good at, Spencer uses this inspirational talk to argue that college sports c...

Architecture student Magnus Larsson details his bold plan to transform the harsh Sahara desert using bacteria and a surprising construction material: the sand itself.

TED-Ed Weekend is a youth conference that brings together student leaders from around the world for a chance to take over TED Headquarters in New York City. TED-Ed Weekend 2020 February 8-9, 2020 New York, NY TED-Ed Weekend showcases and amplifies the voices of the next generation of TED. It’s an opportunity for youth leaders around the world ...

Shane Campbell-Staton seeks to understand how human activity is driving rapid evolutionary change in animals across the planet.

Mahogany-N-Motion, a student-run women's dance group from Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, delivers a drumline-infused performance that brings the crowd to its feet.

Mary Maker believes in the power of education to build peace and rebuild lives.

Performance poet (and math student) Harry Baker spins a love poem about his favorite kind of numbers -- the lonely, love-lorn prime. Stay on for two more lively, inspiring poems from this charming performer.

Stephen Ritz teaches at-risk kids in the South Bronx.

In this hilariously lively performance, actress Sarah Jones channels an opinionated elderly Jewish woman, a fast-talking Dominican college student and more, giving TED2009 just a sample of her spectacular character range.

D-L Stewart empowers and imagines futures that sustain and cultivate the learning, growth and success of minoritized groups in postsecondary education.

"Music is everywhere, and it is in everything," says musician, student and TED-Ed Clubs star Anika Paulson. Guitar in hand, she plays through the beats of her life in an exploration of how music connects us and makes us what we are.

Gorick Ng is a Harvard career adviser, Wall Street Journal bestselling author and sought-after keynote speaker. He is on a mission to demystify the unspoken rules of career success.

Michael Mieni is the first-ever Indigenous IT honours student at the University of Technology Sydney, and he wants to make sure he isn't the last: By using Aboriginal traditions to bridge the digital divide in Indigenous communities, he says, we can reveal untapped brilliance.

College can feel like a lonely place, especially if you're a student of color, a low-income individual, a first-generation youth -- or all three. Educator Chitra Aiyar outlines how she encourages her students to cultivate spaces for other marginalized students to connect and help each other grow.

Olivia Vinckier is a student at Saint Francis High School.

Amy O'Toole is a 12-year-old student who helped run a science experiment inspired by Beau Lotto's participative science approach. At age 10 she became one of the youngest people ever to publish a peer-reviewed science paper.

Engineering student Péter Fankhauser demonstrates Rezero, a robot that balances on a ball. Designed and built by students, Rezero is the first ballbot made to move quickly and gracefully -- and even dance. (Could the Star Wars sphere droid be real? Watch this and judge.)

MIT grad student David Merrill demos Siftables -- cookie-sized, computerized tiles you can stack and shuffle in your hands. These future-toys can do math, play music, and talk to their friends, too. Is this the next thing in hands-on learning?

Deeply affected by devastating floods in his family's home state of Kerala, India, high school student Sarvesh Subramanian decided to dive headfirst into the fight against climate change. In this passionate talk, Subramanian explains how he developed an app that can predict the impact of climate change on human health.