TEDxPenn will host its annual conference — themed “Volta" — on March 29, featuring nine speakers from a variety of artistic, scientific, business, and political disciplines.
The conference, which will take place at 10:30 a.m. at the Zellerbach Theatre in the Annenberg Center, explores the power of turning points, or voltas, that reshape someone's personal and global perspective. TEDxPenn invites attendees to come and listen to the moments that defined the speaker’s lives and to reflect on their own potential for change.
Several speakers bring insight from the business and technology sectors, including leadership, entrepreneurship, and cutting-edge development roles.
2016 Carey Law and Wharton graduate Jett Puckett is an owner in a mergers and acquisitions firm and co-owns a fashion brand and a social media company with his wife. Benjamin Fernandez, founder of the fintech company NALA, builds payment solutions and was the youngest African ever admitted to Stanford’s Graduate School of Business.
Other speakers include Noah Weber, Chief Information Officer at Olden Labs and former CTO of biotech company Celeris Therapeutics, who was named on Forbes' list of 30 Under 30 Europe for his work in AI-supported protein therapeutics; Naheel Jawaid, the founder of the Silicon Valley School of Design and a former Google product designer; and Jaime Teevan, Chief Scientist and Technical Fellow at Microsoft.
Some of the event's other speakers bring creative, educational, and social perspectives. Graduate School of Education graduate Holly Hatcher-Frazier spent over 20 years as an educator before gaining national recognition through her participation in the reality TV show Dance Moms. Associate Dean at University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and Executive Director of the Quattrone Center, John Hollway, contributes nationally to research and consulting in criminal justice reform.
Penn Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Endowed Term Chair in the Humanities and Cinema and Media Studies, professor Peter Decherney is a filmmaker, photographer, and author whose work has appeared in The New York Times and the Miami Film Festival. Malaya Ulan, Philadelphia’s 2024–25 Youth Poet Laureate, merges poetry with dance and film to explore themes of identity and activism.
Tickets for the event may be purchased on the TEDxPenn website. Penn students can use code "pstudent25," "pfaculty25," or "pgroup25" for a discount on their ticket.
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