By Ian Wesselhoff

I n the back of her mind, senior mass communication major Paige Blakemore had thought about giving a TED Talk ever since her middle school teachers began playing them in class. But a year ago, it started to feel tangible. In her role as communications specialist for the Office of Leadership Programs at Georgia College & State University, her first big project was working on last year’s TEDxGeorgiaCollege event.

With scripts in hand, she ensured each speaker’s talk ran smoothly, giving cues when needed and clicking slides to progress through the live performance.

“I was literally front row of everything happening at TEDx,” Blakemore said. “And I thought, ‘I think I’d want to do this.’”

On Oct. 17, that dream becomes a reality. Blakemore will present at Russell Auditorium on the same stage at the third annual TEDxGeorgiaCollege, sharing her ideas not just to those in attendance, but to TED’s global audience.

“I thought this would be something that I would have to aspire to when I was 20, 30 years into a career, not as a college student,” Blakemore said. “But the fact that these opportunities are readily available for our students … I think that speaks volumes to what Georgia College has to offer.”

Blakemore’s talk will explore the way that rural communities are overlooked and misunderstood in mainstream media and how to address that issue through supporting local journalism.

Blakemore will not be the only student presenting at this year’s TEDxGeorgiaCollege. Joining her on that list are seniors Chloe Melton and Carly Walker, who major in history and psychology, respectively. They will take the stage with five other distinguished speakers, including a Grammy-nominated spoken word poet and a neuroscientist.

TEDxGeorgiaCollege is an event licensed by TED featuring a spectrum of speakers from different backgrounds, all with one common goal: To share “ideas worth spreading.” Each iteration of the event has a theme, and this year’s is “Spark.”

The event is organized by Georgia College Leadership Programs and spearheaded by Director Dr. Harold Mock, who says that GCSU and TEDx are a natural fit for each other.

“We have the ideas, TED has the reach and the network,” Mock said.

After the in-person event, TED will publish the talks across its social media channels, including the TEDx Talks YouTube channel and its nearly 44 million subscribers.

“We’ve had viewers and comments from people all around the world – the Americas, Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia – who have connected with Georgia College and our people here through TEDxGeorgiaCollege,” Mock said. “That is our primary audience. It is the world.”

Attendees at the event also have the chance to chat and interact with the speakers during a long intermission.

“The nature of TED is that it is more about the audience than it is about the speaker,” Mock said. “So, we want our audience to connect with our speakers beforehand and at the event itself, talk to them, ask questions and so on.”

Dr. Ashok Hegde, a neuroscientist and the William Harvey Professor of Biomedical Science at GCSU, will focus his talk on neuroscientific life hacks, making research from his field accessible to the public.

Hegde runs the university’s Pre-Med Mentoring Program – 100% of students who have completed the program and sought to enroll in medical school successfully gained admission. Hegde is looking forward to engaging with audience members.

“I’m always excited to talk about neuroscience,” Hegde said. “I want to see how they react and what questions they have.”

Behind the scenes, the event is an opportunity for student leaders to blossom and flourish in volunteer positions, said Dr. Genie Snyder Chamberlin, executive producer of TEDxGeorgiaCollege.

“Obviously, at Georgia College, we focus on leadership. It’s one of our strongest foundational pieces,” Snyder Chamberlin said. “But what I find is whether our students are on the stage or off the stage, I watch them grow into levels of leadership that I have never seen … I see leaders emerge.”

For Mock, TEDxGeorgiaCollege is more than an event – it is an opportunity to highlight how special an institution Georgia College is.

“I want to showcase for the world what we do best at Georgia College and see how fantastic the ideas are that come out of this place, and that we are an institution that is uniquely positioned to bring people together in the service of big ideas,” Mock said.

Header Images: TEDxGeorgiaCollege on Friday, Oct. 17, features eight speakers from Georgia College, Milledgeville and beyond. Photos by Anna Gay Leavitt.