The TEDxOshkosh team was thrilled to bring together another collection amazing people with diverse set of ideas worth spreading. Scroll-through the speaker and topic list, and watch complete video of their talks - right here.
And... since the entirety of TED and TEDx is all about Ideas Worth Sharing - tell friends and colleagues so they can share in the experience too.
Table of Contents: This Year's Talks
(Click/tap any speaker's name to scroll down to their bio and talk details)
Colleen Bies - Why Children of Immigrants Work so Hard
Children of immigrants often have a mindset learned from parents who navigated the roadblocks on their journey to freedom. This talk explores that mindset, and how it could apply to those who are generations away from the immigrant experience.
Colleen Bies Biography
Following twelve years simultaneously serving in the Army National Guard and earning a Bachelor of Business Administration & MBA, Colleen left her corporate finance job to pursue more. In this new chapter, she founded Colleen Bies Photography and Boudoir by Colleen, as well as opening Fika Tea Bar in Appleton.
Colleen and her siblings, including four lost before her family’s immigration, are first generation Hmong in the United States. After her father’s nine years of military service for the US side during the Vietnam war, her family was forced to flee Laos to save their lives. Upon reaching Thailand after trekking for weeks through dense jungle, Colleen’s family made the decision to immigrate to the United States.
Her parents knew the US could offer better and more prosperous lives for them and their children. While as a young person Colleen was embarrassed by her mother’s innovative creation of small businesses rather than a "typical" nine to five job, today, as an entrepreneur herself, she couldn't be more proud of her mother blazing her own path despite knowing very little English. Colleen hopes to inspire people to innovate, create, and take control of their lives.
Zach Evans - Playing it My Way: A New Verse in Music Education
Can it be that traditional ways of learning to play music are backward? Should fundamentals really come first, followed by "fun stuff" only after achieving a level of mastery of the basics? This talk proposes that to optimize learning, getting "quick wins" early is a better way.
Zach Evans Biography
Zach Evans is a professional pianist and piano teacher specializing in the art of accelerated learning; using what we know about the brain to learn piano faster and more efficiently. He's taught hundreds of students, both in-person and online.
Zach grew up in Wisconsin, and attended the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh. There, he studied piano under Dr. Eli Kalman, honing his skills and knowledge and developing his method of learning. After graduating, he moved to Nashville where he earned a reputation as one of the top piano teachers in the area. While there, he started posting his teachings online and quickly grew a following of students interested in learning faster and more effectively. He currently resides in Los Angeles.
Allison Garner - Life is Messy: Let's Stop Pretending it's Not
When confronted with challenge, it’s natural to try to hide our discomfort. This talk will explore the benefit of the opposite approach – accepting and sharing the discomfort that comes with challenges in life.
Allison Garner Biography
Allison Garner is a leadership coach and consultant, founder of Align Coaching, LLC, and author of “Think Possible: The Light and Dark Side of Never Running Out of Ideas”.
Prior to establishing Align Coaching, Allison was a chemical engineering consultant and vice president of a small engineering firm. After nearly 20 years of consulting work which included both domestic and international clients in the mostly male-dominated oil industry, Allison realized her heart’s ambition to do more meaningful work in the world through coaching.
She has been married for 21 years and has two wonderful kids and she has served on several boards of directors, including being elected to the Oshkosh School Board for 9 years and has served as its Treasurer, Vice President, and President.
Sean Gibbons - The First Responder Mindset: The Life You Save May be Your Own
Can you survive long enough to survive? There's a gap of time between when an emergency first occurs and the arrival of experts to save you. This talk will explore the world of emergency response and steps you can take today to maximize your survivability in any emergency.
Sean Gibbons Biography
Sean Gibbons lives as an active participant in life. Born near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, he has lived on the coast of California, by the Gulf of Mexico, in the Mile High City, and numerous places in between. Today, Sean and his wife live in Appleton, Wisconsin with their cat and Great Dane, where he strives for success based upon self-reliance and generosity.
He spends a great deal of his time learning and applying lessons about what it means to be self-reliant, successful, and fulfilled by working diligently to improve his relationships, physical aptitude, and spiritual fitness. Sean draws on his experiences and studies to pursue spirited conversations about the challenges that affect our lives in order to discuss how we are actively participating in life together.
Chris Gleason - Lighting A Fire In Kids: Three Insightful Teaching Truths
We can’t force students to learn. This talk from a veteran educator proposes that a teacher's jobs includes creating the conditions for growth, and cultivating an environment of possibility that will ensure both students and teachers succeed and find their passion.
Chris Gleason Biography
Chris Gleason is an instrumental music educator at Patrick Marsh Middle School in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin. He is the 2017 Wisconsin Middle School Teacher of the Year, 2017 GRAMMY Music Educator Award semifinalist, and the first Wisconsin teacher to be named a finalist for National Teacher of the Year in 50 years.
In 2009 Chris started the ComMission Possible Project that annually commissions a new work for band. He recently served as a Teacher Leadership and Engagement Specialist with the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction inspiring future education majors across the state. Chris was a member of Teach Plus in a national effort to support Title II funding. Mr. Gleason is a 2018-19 NEA Foundation Global Learning Fellow, and is the founder and organizer of the Beyond The Notes Music Festival Inc. a non-profit that has to date inspired more than 33,000 young musicians and 60 future music educators.
Peter Glick - Masculinity Contest Culture: How Organizations Become Toxic, and How to Fix Them
Masculinity contests within organizations create a toxic culture that creates a miserable work environment and leads to organizational dysfunction. This talk addresses how such a culture originates, and what can be done to return the focus on the organization's core mission.
Peter Glick Biography
Peter Glick, PhD is the Henry Merritt Wriston Professor at Lawrence University and a Senior Scientist with the Neuroleadership Institute.
As a visiting Professor of Management and Organizations at Northwestern University, he co-designed the Kellogg School of Management’s first course on diversity management. He has also taught executive education at Harvard University and developed anti-bias initiatives for Fortune 500 companies. The Harvard Business Review recognized his stereotype content model (co-developed with Susan Fiske, Princeton, and Amy Cuddy, Harvard) as a "breakthrough idea for 2009."
His highly cited work on benevolent sexism (with Susan Fiske) has revolutionized our understanding of discrimination against women, receiving the Allport Prize for best paper on intergroup relations. Both theories are highly influential, with over 30,000 Google Scholar citations. In addition to more than 80 articles, he has co-edited or co-authored three books, including the Sage Handbook of Prejudice. His work has been covered in such outlets as the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, and PBS NewsHour.
Isaac Marquardt - Drumming While Disabled: From Cerebral Palsy Diagnosis to Drumming in a Band
Cerebral Palsy is typically thought of as a disability that greatly limits ones choices in life. In what would look like an impossible dream, the speaker was born with both cerebral palsy and a passion to make music. This talk explores the unexpected creative overlap between these two states, and the way that being “disabled” can be a benefit, rather than a burden.
Isaac Marquardt Biography
Isaac Marquardt is a 21-year-old senior at UW Oshkosh, majoring in Radio, TV, and Film with a minor in Music Industry. When he is not in school or hosting a radio show, Isaac plays drums around the country with Wisconsin-based indie rock band Barely Civil.
Andy Olen - "Yes, if" in Getting to Agreement
“Yes, if” - two small words can have a mighty impact in day-to-day life. Used well, those simple words can eliminate the anxiety of conflict-filled negotiations with friends, family, customers or teammates.
Andy Olen Biography
Andy Olen is the Founder and President of North Hall Partners LLC, a sales and leadership engagement firm committed to excellence in skills development. Andy authored the book The Trilogy of Yes and hosts the podcast The Sales Warrior Within.
Prior to founding North Hall Partners, Andy’s corporate career spanned 17 years of sales, marketing, and global leadership experience in the medical technology industry. Andy, and his teams, sold and marketed over $4.5 billion worth of healthcare products on five continents.
Andy currently lives in Milwaukee, and earned both his BA and his MBA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Camin Potts - Small Town “Gangs for Good” - Anonymously
What if youth gangs formed to do good? What if they did so to make their community a better place? What if they did all of this anonymously?
That exact thing has happened in the small town of Waupaca Wisconsin, and this talk will share outcomes for the youth and the community, plus the potential for the concept to spread.
Camin Potts Biography
Freelance graphic artist Camin Potts was a parent looking for ways to actively engage her child and others in the neighborhood in activities that built up a mindset of abundance and gratitude. She loves the idea of empowering kids to become strong leaders by putting others first.
Camin started the Waupaca Secret Service when her son (now a Junior at Waupaca High School) was in third grade. Each year more and more students in Waupaca take the opportunity to help locally and globally. The projects children work on with the Waupaca Secret Service help make the big world to seem smaller, help them to see that adults and business owners support the community and feel the intense pride that comes from doing what is right, without expecting anything else in return.
Aaron Smith - Paws and Effect: A Journey of Transformation
Puppies can be trained to become service dogs. And those same puppies can help teach a person to become of service to others. Through the experience of one of those trainers, this talk explores how dogs as young as eight weeks old are helping transform the lives of their trainers and those in the community one paw print at a time.
Aaron Smith Biography
Aaron Smith is a Wisconsin resident who began his journey to train dogs in 2018. Over the past year, he has volunteered hundreds of hours to raise close to twenty potential service dogs and is working toward assisting veterans and crime victims in learning to use a service dog to help with their post-traumatic stress disorder.
Aaron has worked with over 70 other volunteers with similar dog training goals. He started out as a novice to dog training but through team work and empathy, he has become a highly skilled dog trainer as well as instructor for other volunteers. He will be earning a dog grooming and dog training certificate from Fox Valley Technical College.
Alex Tyink - Disrupting the Food System: Innovative Models of Fresh Food Delivery
Fresh, healthy, and economical food delivery is a key component in driving healthy community outcomes. This talk explores real-world solutions to enhance fresh food access, including game-changing "vertical farming" technology.
Alex Tyink Biography
Alex Tyink began his career in urban agriculture 10 years ago in Brooklyn, NY where he worked as a farm manager on rooftop gardens. From there, he was contracted by 18 non-profit organizations in New York to build customized grow systems for educational and food security purposes.
From these itellectual property of those installations, he created the Fork Farms, where is is president/CEO. He holds multiple issued and pending patents in vertical farming. Tyink has served as Program Director at Goodwill Industries of North Central Wisconsin and as Director of Innovation and Programs for Feeding America Eastern Wisconsin. His work has been featured in USA Today, Insight Magazine, Fox Cities Magazine and numerous other articles.
He is the 2018 Future 15 winner and 2019 WI Innovation Awards Finalist.
Andy Weins - Supporting Soldiers Out of the Hole
The transition from military to civilian life can be extremely difficult. This talk, from veteran Andy Weins, explores the way veterans, or others undergoing substantial life transitions, can help themselves, and as importantly, how the community can help veterans in their transition to civilian life.
Andy Weins Biography
Andy Weins has built a reputation through his no-holds-barred teaching style, which inspires immediate and transformational action. No Frills, no fluff. Andy’s business, Green Up Solutions, has grown from a two-man backyard operation to a nationally renowned multi-faceted enterprise in rapid pace. As an adviser and public speaker, he has helped thousands of leaders and entrepreneurs unleash their full potential and achieve unparalleled success.
A proud US Army Veteran, military career counselor, and Master Resiliency Trainer, Andy brings his battle-tested experience and expertise to business leaders and professional everywhere.
Paul Wiegel - Writing Poems in the Street
Many years and hundreds of poems written “on the street” reveal fascinating insight into the psyche of people in our communities. This talk will explore the lessons learned by a veteran “street poet” writing poems for other people.
Paul Wiegel Biography
Paul Wiegel has been writing on-demand poems as a "street writer" on his manual typewriter for passersby at art galleries, farmers' markets, and festivals for the past eight years. In that time, he has written over 1,500 poems for people on subjects as diverse as doughnuts, reunions, micro-brewed beer, cottages, violins, and women’s flat track roller derby.
While he mostly writes for other people on the street, his own poetry has appeared both in print and online including The English Journal, Hummingbird, and Whale Road Review. He is a past winner of Irish Fest’s John Gahagan Poetry Prize, has presented at the Wisconsin Poetry Festival, Untitledtown Book Festival, Central Wisconsin Book Festival, and is yearly demonstrator at ArtStreet in Green Bay and Art Fair Off the Square in Madison. Paul has also been a contributing writer at Wisconsin Public Radio as part of their Wisconsin Life program.
