Ideas worth spreading

While in Jaipur we met up for a coffee with a delightful young man, Ajit, who had mounted TEDx Jaipur last year and has another conference being planned for this year. Ajit had been introduced by Becca, who works for TED and is a former MBA student of mine, and co-organizer of a TEDx conference in Toronto last year.

Ajit works in the family business making technology equipment for the dairy industry in India and other southeastern Asian countries. What a delightful young man, full of enthusiasm spreading good ideas, and bringing together people who are interested in ideas. He has some great plans for his conference to keep attendees totally engaged, and some fascinating speakers already lined up. He was keen to hear what I'd learned as curator of TEDxIBYork last year, and we had a lively discussion of what makes for a good TEDx and how to wring the best out of speakers. It was great to hear what he'd learned and how he experience differed a bit between Canada and India.

Chris Anderson has truly succeeded in his vision of making TED a global community, when you can walk into a foreign country and have instant rapport with someone who shares a passion for expanding their knowledge and impressions of the world and for ideas worth spreading.

The Mark News

Thought readers of this blog might be interested in a short article published in The Mark News about TED's evolution and spirit, and the TEDxIBYork conference in Toronto.  The Mark is an interesting site, aimed at providing an outlet for a wide variety of Canadian voices.  Check it out.

Dr. Greg Wells Joins the TEDxIBYork Roster

During the Winter Olympics this year, I was riveted to the TV when Dr. Greg Wells was explaining the physiology of the athletes as they performed astonishing feats on ice and snow.  Science, graphics and clear explanations by someone who looked like he was having the time of this life all combined to make this one of my favourite parts of Olympic coverage. 

Did you enjoy him too?  If so, now's your chance to hear Greg Wells in person, at TEDxIBYork.  Wells has studied extreme human physiology in both elite athletes and children with chronic diseases.  He's going to talk to us about what makes Olympians different.  How do they live their lives differently in order to achieve their goals and how can we apply those lessons in our own lives?   Won't that be an interesting analysis?

The Genuine Progress Index comes to TEDxIBYork

The most common benchmark when measuring countries is GNP, or Gross National Product, a financial measure of the goods and services created in a country.  A nation's GNP reflects the average income of its citizens.  Gross National Happiness is a term coined by the King of Bhutan in 1972 to highlight the fact that a people's happiness is what's really important and happiness involves many more aspects than just wealth.

There has been considerable research on finding a metric for happiness in individuals.  There was a recent New Yorker article surveying several books that describe attempts to scientifically measure happiness and what increases happiness.  One of the books mentioned in this article is Stumbling on Happiness by Daniel Gilbert.  Gilbert gave a great talk at TED (see it here) and blasted many myths about what we think will make us happy and what really makes us happy.

So how might all this be put together in a metric for national happiness, or at least national wellbeing?  The Genuine Progress Indicator has been proposed as a quantitative measurement of the overall wellbeing of a country replacing, or at least complementing, GNP as the economic measure of its production and consumption.  Leading practitioners of the GPI happen to be right here in Canada - at GPI Atlantic in Halifax - and we're fortunate to have Gwen Colman of GPI Atlantic coming to TEDxIBYork to tell us more about this.

I'm a strong believer in the old saw that you succeed at what you measure, so I'm really looking forward to hearing Gwen.

Tom Wujec on Design

Tom Wujec has agreed to be a speaker at the TEDxIBYork conference.  A fellow at Autodesk, Tom is just completing a book on design and is much in demand around the globe as a speaker on a variety of topics.  We're lucky to have snagged a day in his busy schedule.

Jane and I (the program committee for the conference) just had a phone call with him discussing his talk.  We came away very excited about his planned kaleidoscopic view of the intersection of design and the recent technology trends that are revolutionizing design, and just maybe giving us the tools to address the world's biggest problems.  Tom's extremely articulate, knowledgeable on a wide range of topics, and attuned to fitting his wealth of knowledge into the theme What in the World?

His bio has just gone up on TEDxIBYork.com, so take a peak for more details there.

Ushahidi

One of the speakers at the TEDx conference, Juliana Rotich, is a co-founder of Ushahidi.  There is an interesting reference to Ushahidi in a recent Economist article here.  It certainly whats one's appetite for hearing her speaker at TEDx.

Teaching with Passion

The latest addition to the TEDx roster is Joel Gottlieb, a teacher from Rosedale Heights School for the Arts here in Toronto.  Joel is one of those teachers who make a difference in the lives of their students - at least that's what they say year after year in his yearbook!  "You have allowed me to grow beyond my assumed limits to a place where I can write my own future" is a typical comment. 

Joel will reflect on the ingredients for such magic to happen.  It should be interesting to all our attendees because of course we're all teachers from time to time.

Joel has also introduced us to the body of performers at Rosedale Heights, and we will be having a visit from some wonderful dancers.  More about that later.

There's a Doctor in the House

Another speaaker is confirmed for TEDx: Dr. Kieran Murphy.  I really enjoyed talking to Kieran to settle the details.  He's a neuroradiologist, and he's also an inventor with over 50 patents to his name.  He's very well traveled - he talked about a recent trip to Kenya for instance - and he particularly focuses on designing simple medical devices that are globally relevant.  Quite a match for our theme What in the World.

Kieran's a fan of TED.com, as are his two children, and he uses TED talks in some of his presentations.  As always, it's nice to have a committed TEDster as part of the team.

But Kieran's broad interests don't stop there.  He is a car racer, and the photo he submitted for his bio was taken at Mosport.  I Googled him and saw this report from August 12 of this year:  "Kieran Murphy retook the lead of the Formula Ford B class with his fourth and fifth place finishes in the Class".  So he's successful there too.  He'll be an interesting guy to talk to at the conference!

Helping Deaf People Hear Music? What in the World is that About?

Frank Russo wants to help deaf people hear. He and his team at the SMART (Science of Music, Auditory Research and Technology) Lab at Ryerson University have developed the Emoti-Chair, which translates music into tactile sensations. A deaf person sitting in the chair shows similar brain patterns to a person with hearing who listens to music.

His work certainly qualifies as fitting the theme What in the World?

Russo is the latest addition to our TEDx Conference and I'm dying to hear him delve into the relationship between Mind, Music and Technology. We're hoping he can have his Emoti-Chair on display there too.

Sarian Joins Speaker Roster for TEDx

Alex Sarian is passionate about how you can use arts subjects to help strengthen students in their core subjects. In our phone discussion, he talked about how a project in New York where, by involving students in arts education, their grades demonstrably rose in their core subjects. He is working with the ministry of education in Brazil to undertake a simmilar project there.

Although Toronto born, Alex grew up in Buenos Aires, where he graduated from an IB program there. In our discussion, he mentioned that he'd been reflecting recently on how his IB education had contributed to the direction his life has taken. I'm looking forward to hearing his views.

McGahan Recognized as Outstanding Educator

Another one of our TEDxIBYork speakers has been recognized for outstanding accomplishment. Anita McGahan is the recipient of the Academy of Management Business Policy and Strategy Division's 2010 Irwin Outstanding Educator Award. The award committee noted her 'outstanding contributions to the students she has taught, to the colleagues whose teaching she has improved, to the courses and course materials she has developed, and to the management understanding that her research has created'. Having seen Anita in action at the Rotman School, I totally agree with this assessment.

In her acceptance speech, Anita conveyed her frustration with the current formulation of MBA programs. While many of her students have gone on to worthy achievements in life, too many (one is too many, of course) have used their skills to engage in financial chicanery or unthinking pursuit of tawdry corporate goals.

McGahan's mother was a Grade Two teacher in the tough South Bronx - one of those special teachers who make a difference. While not offering a prescription for how to fix MBA education, McGahan does end her speech with a reflection of some lessons she learned from her mother. They centre on inspiring students by showing them something better than the narrow world they live in. For the South Bronx kids, it was field trips to open their eyes beyond the constrained environment they lived in. For MBA students, it might be showing them how their skills could be used to better the world. We hope that TEDxIBYork might in some small way inspire its audience to broader thinking about the world.

Cleo Paskal Receives Grantham Award of Special Merit

Cleo Paskal, one of our TEDxIBYork speakers, has been recognized with an Award of Special Merit by the Grantham Prize for her book Global Warring (previously mentioned and heartily recommended in this blog). The Grantham Prize for Excellence in Reporting on the Environment was established in 2005 to recognize the work of a journalist or team of journalists for exemplary reporting on the environment.

It was a big year for Canadians in this category. In addition to Cleo winning the Award of Special Merit, Alanna Mitchell, former Globe and Mail reporter, took home the big prize ($75,000!) for her book Sea Sick: The Global Ocean in Crisis. The jury described her as 'reporting it like a demon and writing like an angel'. This is now officially on my must-read list.

Slam Poetry

A great part of a TED conference is the change of pace delivered by short punchy 3 to 5 minute talks. We will be including several of these in our TEDxIBYork program, and we're delighted that two slam poets will be joining us in this category, Lishai, and David Silverberg.

Poetry is no longer relegated to the dusty tomes we might have read in high school. It's out there communicating with the people in a mix of poetry and performance art. Lishai and Silverberg are both accomplished practitioners of the art. One of our committee who attended a performance recently, assures me we have a great treat in store!

Exploring Space

I'm happy to announce that we have another fascinating speaker for TEDxIBYork. Bob Richards is a Toronto boy, having studied engineering at Ryerson and physics and astronomy at University of Toronto. He then headed to the US for a space science degree at Cornell, where he became special assistant to Carl Sagan.

Since his education, Bob has been immersed in space ventures. In 1987, he co-founded the International Space University, based in Strasbourg France, providing graduate-level education in all disciplines related to space programs and enterprises - space science, space engineering, systems engineering, space policy and law, business and management, and space and socirty. The ISU develops the future leaders of the world space community by providing interdisciplinary educational programs to students and space professionals in an international, intercultural environment.

Bob is still very active at ISU, and received an honorary doctorate from the institution in 2005. He's also the recipient of the K. E. Tsiolkovski Medal in Russia, the Space Frontier Vision to Reality award in the US, the Arthur C. Clarke Commendation in Sri Lanka, and the Aviation and Space Technology Laurel in the US. He may not be an astronaut, but he does get around on earth!

Bob is CEO of Odyssey Moon Limited, which is developing a sustainable commercial transportation system to deliver payload services to the Moon in support of science, exploration and commerce. The Company has designed a commercial lunar robotic transportation service to meet the pent up and growing demand for low cost, frequent access to the Moon and is a contender for the $30M Google Lunar XPrize.

More recently, Bob was a founding trustee of Singularity University. Based at NASA Ames campus in Silicon Valley, its mission is to assemble, educate and inspire leaders who understand and develop exponentially advancing technologies to address humanity's Grand Challenges.

The Geopolitics of Environmental Change

You heard me describe a wonderful book I read back in May. I'm so pleased that we have been able to attract Cleo Paskal, the author of Global Warring: How Environmental, Economic and Political Crises Will Redraw the World Map to speak at our TEDx conference. I'm really pumped to have her insight on many of the events that have happened since the publication of her book.

Worm Poop to Oreos - A Story of Upward Mobility

Tom Szaky is an enterprising eco-capitalist – you could almost call him an environmental rock star. He's a Canadian who headed south to university at Princeton. There, in time-honoured entrepreneurial fashion, he started a business in his dorm room producing environmentally friendly fertilizer from worm poop! Down to earth beginnings indeed. In the small world category, my daughter in Princeton was one of his first customers! WalMart, Home Depot and others followed, providing TerraCycle with its breakthrough opportunity. Within five years, Inc. Magazine named TerraCycle “The Coolest Little Start-Up in America” and Tom the #1 CEO in America Under 30.

Tom and TerraCycle are part of the sustainable business movement. Now his company produces a myriad of products, all from recycled material. It’s an idea he calls Sponsored Waste. TerraCycle gets low cost waste materials by working with companies such as Kraft Foods, Frito-Lay, Mars, Kashi, Stonyfield Farm, CLIF BAR and Honest Tea. TerraCycle upcycles the collected ‘waste’ material into affordable, eco-friendly products. Now, this Oreo bag is much more appetizing than worm poop!

Tom's been recommended by several people as an exciting and persuasive speaker. National Geographic TV seems to think so - they will be starting a season of Garbage Moguls, after a successful pilot last year.

Our next speaker for TEDx is golden

The next speaker we’ve confirmed is Rob McEwen. On the face of it, Rob is a ‘business’ speaker. After all, he's Chair and CEO of US Gold and Lexam Explorations. He famously ran Goldcorp , one of the most stunning successes in Canadian business. During his time at the helm, Gold Corp's market capitalization went from $50M to $10B. He was named by Canadian Business magazine as Canada's Most Innovative CEO in 2006 and made Fast Company magazine's The Fast 50 Champion of Innovation list. In June 2007, he was named to the Order of Canada.

Like the very best of business people, he's used his money for good. His largest contribution has been in establishing the McEwen Centre for Regenerative Medicine at the Toronto General Hospital, helping maintain Toronto’s global leadership in stem cell research.

So, Rob certainly has the credentials to count as a business speaker. But I see him in a different light. To me, he represents the best i n creative and innovative thinking, and the courage to try something entirely new. The way he made Gold Corp successful was by defying the 'known' truths of how you run a mining company. He exploited the power of the Internet and collaborative cross-industry creativity to reach for success. When I find my students languishing in the doldrums of thinking the same old way about problems, I evoke McEwen's experience to jolt them into letting go of what they 'know' and striking out with contrarian thinking.

When you set up a program like this one for TEDxIBYork, you have to reach beyond your own limited experience, so you ask lots of people for their opinion about who would be a great, not a good, speaker. Rob was described as charismatic by many of the people I polled. I've wanted to hear Rob speak for a long time; I can't wait to see him on our TEDxIBYork stage.