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TEDxUoN are staging the biggest event they’ve ever organised. The aim is to expand people’s horizons and get them to ‘fall in love’ with learning and talking about ideas that they would never normally come across.
Among the 12 invited speakers at the sell-out event, being held on Jubilee Campus at The University of Nottingham, will be Sir Peter Mansfield — The University of Nottingham physicist awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 2003 for his part in the invention of the MRI scanner. Other speakers and performers, from a host of different fields, will include an award winning film-maker, a local chef, a dreaming poet and a pop-up problem solver. Each will have just 12 minutes to speak about their chosen subject.
Iain Botterill a third year theology student, is one of the organisers. He said: “TEDxUoN 2014 will bring together people who are open minded and prepared to share their ideas and learn from others.”
TEDx is a non-profit organisation dedicated to ideas worth spreading. What began as a four day conference in California 25 years ago is now an organisation supporting a host of events and media and online initiatives around the world. The first event at The University of Nottingham was held in 2012. Since then they’ve staged a number of separate events but this will be by far the biggest.
Iain said: “The world’s problems are now so big and everything is so inter-related we need to do more to bring together people from different backgrounds to share different ideas and talk about their ideas, problems and how they went about solving them.
“Conventionally we solve our problems in quite linear formats, so the scientists solve the science problems and the mathematicians solve the maths problems but what TED does really well is bring together different fields so you can get mathematicians talking to artists, talking to musicians, talking to creatives. This collaboration is key to solving our problems and unlocking a better future.”
The student organisers have already filled the 490 seat auditorium with an audience drawn from students at the University, from local schools, local charities, University staff and academics and members of the public.
As well as presentations there will be workshops, interactive experiments and a chance to share and explore ideas.
The TEDxUoN event is being held this Sunday 6 April 2014 on Jubilee Campus at the Business School South. It starts at 09.45am and closes at 17.00pm.
A limited amount of tickets are available for media and local bloggers. Email mail@tedxuon.com for more information.
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Our academics can now be interviewed for broadcast via our new Globelynx fixed camera facility at the University. For further information please contact a member of the Communications team on +44 (0)115 951 5798, email mediahub@nottingham.ac.uk or see the Globelynx website for how to register for this service.
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Notes to editors: The University of Nottinghamhas 43,000 students and is ‘the nearest Britain has to a truly global university, with campuses in China and Malaysia modelled on a headquarters that is among the most attractive in Britain’ (Times Good University Guide 2014). It is also the most popular university among graduate employers, the world’s greenest university, and winner of the Times Higher Education Award for ‘Outstanding Contribution to Sustainable Development’. It is ranked in the World's Top 75 universities by the QS World University Rankings.
Impact: The Nottingham Campaign, its biggest-ever fundraising campaign, is delivering the University’s vision to change lives, tackle global issues and shape the future. More news…