Speakers

Event Host

Kaveri Bittira, co-host CBC News: Saskatchewan at 5, 5:30 & 6pm

About Kaveri

Kaveri has been living and working in Saskatoon since 2002 and is proud to call the bridge city home. In 2009, after spending several years as a television reporter, Kaveri joined the anchor desk as co-host of CBC News: Saskatchewan at 5, 5:30 & 6pm broadcast weekdays on CBC Television. Kaveri’s career with CBC began in 1999, in her hometown of Fredericton, New Brunswick where she worked as both a radio and television reporter. Kaveri loves to be active in the Saskatoon community and volunteers her time to many organizations including Saskatoon Family Services. Kaveri graduated from St. Thomas University in New Brunswick with a Journalism degree, and an English degree with a minor in International Relations.

Speakers

The 2010 TEDx Saskatoon speakers have been confirmed and will be announced periodically as the event nears. Twelve speakers and four TEDx videos will fill this year’s event including:

Will Democracy Survive?

His Honour the Honourable Dr. Gordon L. Barnhart, S.O.M.
Lieutenant Governor of Saskatchewan

Returning home from consulting experiences in volatile countries, I am overwhelmed by the extraordinary rights and freedoms we enjoy in Canada, not to mention the standard of living. I am also deeply distressed by the number of Canadians who don’t understand that our privileged existence is the result of a system of government that requires the engagement of citizens. Young people, in particular, feel disconnected from the system. How can we motivate Canadians to get involved in governance? It is a crucial question, upon which our future relies.

About Dr. Barnhart

Lieutenant Governor Gordon Barnhart is an acclaimed historian and recognized expert on the Canadian parliamentary process. Dr. Barnhart’s extensive experience in government includes twenty years as Clerk of the Saskatchewan Legislature and five years as Clerk of the Canadian Senate. He has worked as a consultant to strengthen democratic governance in countries around the world. Dr. Barnhart obtained a Ph.D. in history at the University of Saskatchewan, where he taught political studies and served as University Secretary. He has published several books on prairie history and Saskatchewan political figures.

Peaceful Coexistence – One Mind @ a Time

Gregg Cochlan

Modern media thrives on controversy. The problem is that the debate is rarely even-handed. Instead, it is a clash of polarized opinions and a contest of wills to have one opinion triumph over all others. Choosing which side of a polarized debate you are on is not the road to coexistence, and certainly not the way to world peace. Coexistence demands that you be able to see more than your own perspective. It also throws out the ultimate challenge: even when you do not agree with other ideas, can you live peacefully alongside them?

About Gregg

Gregg Cochlan is an author, speaker, consultant and leadership coach whose first book, Love Leadership, challenged traditional corporate conditioning by positioning love as a more effective, sustainable leadership style. Gregg newest book World Peace, Really offers to it’s reader the application of cognitive psychology to enable peaceful coexistence. Since 1986 he has been helping industry leaders deal with the challenges of change. Gregg is the managing Director of The Pacific Institute a Seattle‐based educational and coaching company that provides critical thinking skills that enable individuals and organizations to increase their overall effectiveness.

Women, Water, and Will Power

Dr. Monique Dubé

Make no mistake, water is a foundation for everything, goods and services, a strong economy, natural resource extraction, health, wellness, recreation and of course food production, energy production, waste removal and drinking water. In the global water world it has been recognized by agencies like the United Nations that if we are to achieve the Millennium Development Goals, providing access to safe drinking water for example, we have to educate women. Why? Because it is the women in the developing world that manage the water, find the water, and walk for hours to fetch the water.

About Monique

Dr. Monique Dubé is a Canada Research Chair in Aquatic Ecosystem Health Diagnosis at the University of Saskatchewan. Her interest is to bring “science to service” with a focus on assessing and managing freshwater rivers and their watersheds. Monique has 20 years experience working across public, academic, government, industry (pulp and paper, mining, oil sands), consulting, and global (United Nations) networks. Never bored, Monique is a wife, mother of two, endurance kayak adventure racer, ultra-marathon runner, singer/songwriter and occasionally runs a horse around a few barrels!

Inspiration and Creation – From Small Things…

Jay Semko

There are so many ways to get inspired to create – I believe that everyone has the ability to find their own creative self, and to use the creativity discovered through music, writing and the arts in all facets of our lives. Tapping into the subconscious mind, where many of the most interesting ideas are waiting to be found can be done by anyone, using some of the things I have learned through my experiences in songwriting.

About Jay

Jay Semko is known across Canada and beyond as singer/songwriter/bassist with multi-platinum selling Canadian pop/rock icons the Northern Pikes, and as an award winning music composer for numerous films and television productions, including Canada’s most successful internationally syndicated series, “Due South”. He is widely considered one of Canada’s finest songsmiths, and has co-written with many well known songwriters in Canada and the USA. Jay recently released his sixth solo album, and continues to instruct and mentor at numerous songwriting seminars and workshops across Canada. For more info about Jay visit www.jaysemko.com.

The Return of Barn Raisings and Pop Ins

Dean Shareski

Ten years ago Robert Putnam wrote Bowling Alone where he described the rise and fall of community. Our connected world is redefining community and allowing us to return to some of the goodness lost in an age of individual, self sufficient pursuits. As an educator, the social spaces and collaborative environments are challenging schools’ emphasis on individual learning and forcing us to think about school and community in some new and interesting ways.

About Dean

Dean Shareski is a Digital Learning Consultant for Prairie South School Division in Moose Jaw, SK. He works with teachers and students in understanding the power of the Read/Write Web. Dean is an advocate of design, storytelling and the power of sharing. He’s been modeling this on his own blog (www.ideasandthoughts.org) for nearly six years. He won the 2010 ISTE Award for Outstanding Leader of the Year. A husband, father, dog owner and golf nut, Dean never takes himself too seriously and credits the smart people he is connected to for helping him be a life long learner.

Saskatoon Garlic Self-Sufficiency

Ellen Quigley

Saskatoon Garlic Self-Sufficiency by 2012 is:

Practical — Garlic grows readily here, a relatively modest amount of garlic is needed for self-sufficiency, and the project enjoys community support already; earlier this month volunteers planted nearly 6,000 cloves in donated yards.


Healthy — Grown naturally and available fresh, local garlic is chemical-free and more potent than far-flung varieties. Packed with antibiotic, antiviral, and antifungal compounds, garlic helps prevent colds and flu and has been linked to other positive health effects.


Ethical — This initiative employs young people at fair wages; in contrast, workers in China are paid slave wages to grow garlic that is flown thousands of kilometres to reach us.


Delicious — Local garlic is fresher, cleaner, and more potent; the difference in taste is enormous.

About Ellen

Born and raised in Saskatoon, Ellen Quigley is a 25-year-old community organizer and founder of We Are Many (WAM), a local youth environmental organization with a particular focus on cycling and urban agriculture.  She holds a B.A. in English literature.

Networks, Openness, and the Future of Education

Alec Couros
In the past decade, our society has seen a remarkable advance in the availability of new communication technologies, the insurmountable growth of knowledge, and the rise of new networking technologies. Yet, formal educational institutions have been slow to respond to these trends; the very same trends that will undoubtedly result in the end of education as we know it. Alec will discuss the relevant context of our information age and describe a growing open movement, where sharing, transparency, collaboration, and networking have become the norm.

About Alec

Dr. Alec Couros is an Associate Professor of educational technology and media at the Faculty of Education, University of Regina. He has given hundreds of workshops and presentations, nationally and internationally, on topics such as openness in education, social/networked learning, learning environments, digital citizenship, and critical media literacy. His graduate and undergraduate courses help current and future educators understand how to use and take advantage of the educational potential offered by the tools of connectivity.

Dharma (Purpose of Life)

Dale Zak
The Law of Dharma states that every human has a unique talent, and it’s your purpose in life to discover that special gift, and use it to help others. What special gift do you have to offer? What is your life’s purpose?

About Dale

Dale Zak is a software developer passionate about social change. After spending a number of years developing applications for the corporate world, Dale has now shifted his focus to helping initiatives that promote positive change. His past projects include developing a mobile application for Ushahidi’s crowdsourced crisis mapping system, helping The Extraordinaries develop their revolutionary micro-volunteering platform, and contributing to the opensource FrontlineSMS project which is used by NGO’s around the world. This past spring he travelled to Rwanda to help deploy a medical record system in a small rural hospital.

Raw Vision – The Power of Art in Health Care

Jeff Nachtigall

I believe that we are all artists. Art is our first language. Before we can read or write or speak we are drawing; making marks to express ourselves. Some say that it was our ability to communicate visually that gave homo sapiens the evolutionary edge. Art can empower those that have lost the ability to communicate. Those that find themselves on the margins of society can reclaim their voice. In my twenty years as an artist I have seen art transform lives. Art is a vehicle for change.

About Jeff

One of Canada’s most prolific artists, Jeff has exhibited widely throughout North America and Europe for the past 20 years. His expressive and politically charged work is represented in a number of private and public collections. His curatorial practice has received critical acclaim, including The Insiders (2007), an exhibition of drawings and paintings by individuals with limited mobility and cognitive disorders, and 2010’s much anticipated (In)Accessible City featuring the largest painting ever exhibited in Saskatchewan. In 2009 Jeff was short listed for the Lieutenant Governor’s Award in Art’s and Learning, and is currently Artist in Residence at Sherbrooke Community Centre in Saskatoon where he is revolutionizing the arts in health care.

Eat Locally – Live Globally

Amy Jo Ehman

There is no denying we live in a global marketplace. Supermarkets are overflowing with good things to eat. Saskatchewan is a major food producer, yet it’s almost impossible to find the label “Made in Saskatchewan” in the local grocery store. Where to start? How can we tap into the elusive local food market, and is it worth the effort? I can attest that it’s hard work, but worth every bite.

About Amy Jo

Five years ago, Amy Jo and her husband John embarked on a culinary adventure – to serve (almost) nothing but the foods of Saskatchewan on their dinner table for one year. When the year was up, they didn’t quit. That journey was the basis for her book Prairie Feast: A Writer’s Journey Home for Dinner, a joyous exploration of the social and cultural connections forged through the food we eat.

ZZZ…Best You Can Be!

Carolyn Schur

We give lip service to the importance of sleep, yet deprive ourselves of it at every turn. Carolyn Schur makes the case that to be ‘ZZZ…Best’ we can be, we must make sleep a priority.

About Carolyn

A speaker, author and consultant, Carolyn Schur helps people sleep better so that they feel better and work better. She works with organizations to manage sleepiness and fatigue in the workplace and is the founder of a sleep disorders screening centre in Saskatoon. As a young adult, she struggled with her own sleep/wake issues. After much research and the publication of her first book, she became an advocate and speaker and is known internationally for her expertise on the behavior of people called ‘night owls.’

A Community Fairy Tale

Ainsley Robertson

Fairy tales exist in our community, if you look for them. This is a story of a real fairy tale: The Princess Shop, a local nonprofit organization in Saskatoon. This is a story of a community that collectively embraced an idea. This is a story of how a community created impact by working together and recognizing a need that was not currently being met. This is the story of The Princess Shop: an example of a true fairy tale in Saskatoon.

About Ainsley

Ainsley Robertson discovered a passion for Saskatoon and for serving our community while pursuing her Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of Saskatchewan. Ainsley is the Executive Director and Co-Founder of The Princess Shop, a non-profit that provides female students with mentorship and tools to succeed after graduation.  As Director of High School Programs for Junior Achievement, Ainsley provides financial literacy, business and entrepreneurial education programs for high school students. In 2008, Ainsley was nominated for a YWCA Women of Distinction Award. Ainsley is currently a candidate for Saskatoon Ward 5 City Councillor in the upcoming byelection.