BUILDING BRIDGES
Nine local speakers scheduled for TEDx ABQ Women event
Women will take over the stage at the KiMo Theatre this week to offer inspiring words as part of the TEDx ABQ Women event.
Nine women from different backgrounds, age groups and professions will give talks during the event. TED talks were started decades ago to give speakers who have “ideas worth spreading” an opportunity to take their message to a large group of people.
The theme for this year’s women’s event is bridges. One of the event’s co-organizers, Alicia Kirson, said national TED organizers chose the theme that will be used for talks across the country but local organizers get to interpret that theme. Kirson said organizers came up with a description for their event.
“Women of New Mexico are strong, valiant trailblazers who from their personal bridges, the spine of their backs, and rich stories from their lips, inspire, empower and transform ideas into reality,” she said. “They build them (bridges), they cross them, and sometimes they even burn them.”
Speakers will be: Jackie Apodaca, co-founder of Open Source Kids, which teaches elementary-age students computer science, robotics and coding; Alannah Avelin, a successful photographer; Val Day-Sánchez, co-founder of All This Publications, a website that tackles the issues of race; Rosanna Dill, who has had several professions and works to help people with differing opinions have meaningful and useful conversations; Magdalena Sandoval Donahue, who tries to make science more accessible and applicable through mobile technology, art, outreach and education programs; Sidni Lamb and high school senior Sophie Toth, who will focus on the benefit of mentorships and using mindfulness to solve community problems; Abrianna Morales, who was sexually assaulted at 15 and started the Sexual Assault Youth Support Network; and Mia Napolitano, a South Korean native adopted by a family in Santa Fe who is now the assistant general counsel for the state’s environment department.
Kirson said more than 100 people applied to speak at the event. An eight-person selection committee narrowed that group down to the nine women who will give the talks. The women had to be from New Mexico, or currently living or working in New Mexico. The criteria the committee used was whether the topic was interesting, if it presented a novel concept or an old concept in a unique way and the speaker’s expertise.
“TED talks in general are all about ideas worth spreading,” Kirson said. “We want to promote women of New Mexico because they also have great ideas and are innovative.”