Under the theme “(re)think,” the goal of the event is to question the status quo and consider how a single individual’s idea might radically alter an entire community, according to their website.
Dr. Lauren Lemley, assistant professor of communications and director of the speaking center, is organizing the event and expressed her excitement in ACU hosting their very own.
“I use TED Talks in my classroom all the time, so I know they do a great job at communicating ideas,” Lemley said. “I am hoping to use the name and the organization to help create an audience for conversations in the community.”
TED, which stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, is a nonprofit organization that hosts a few conferences over the course of a year with the goal of sharing groundbreaking ideas from great minds around the world. While the event taking place at ACU is not an official TED Talk, the conference is associated under the name TEDxACU.
No speakers have been selected yet, but Lemley wants to put the audience in charge of who will speak.
“We really want our audience to go on to our website and nominate people who they want to hear speak,” Dr. Lemley said. “While we will have representation on campus and alumni, something that we really want is to have the Abilene community representation as well.”
Lemley said the network and diversity of speakers is really going to be the cornerstone of the event.
“One of TED’s big goals is the networking and engagement of people around ideas,” she said. “If we can get a bunch of people in the room who all have different perspectives on a topic, we might be able to solve problems or reimagine how we address issues.”
The conference will host a diverse number of speakers from around the Abilene community. Also, a current ACU student will be selected to speak on a topic of their choice.
“The TED format requires this to be interdisciplinary, so the main goal is diversity of ideas and speakers all around the concept of innovation,” Lemley said.
Attendance to the event will be by individual application only as there will be a very limited number of student tickets available. Applications to attend will be accepted starting January 1, but applications and nominations to speak at the event are currently open through the beginning of November. For up-to-date information on TEDxACU, to nominate a speaker or apply for attendance, visit the TEDxACU blog at http://blogs.acu.edu/tedxacu/.