With the stage lights on and youth voices prepared to speak, Newbury Park High School’s [NPHS] TEDx club hosted its first ever event on April 17 with the theme “Youth Voices, Global Impact.” TEDx Youth is an international program under the licensed organization TEDx and provides students a platform to give speeches about topics they are passionate about to the community.
Arth Dalsania, junior, founded the NPHS TEDx club his sophomore year due to his passion for public speaking and desire to connect with other youth voices. Dalsania chose to speak about why scientific research and interests should be motivated by curiosity, sparked by his interest in theoretical physics and observation that the subject is not seen around often. “There’s so many subjects that so many people are interested in and are passionate about asking questions in those subjects, but they are viewed as less important because they don’t provide immediate return, and that’s been a problem especially recently,” Dalsania said. “It’s been happening for the past few decades in this country that we’ve been stopping giving money to scientists who just want to pursue their curiosity, and our future progress will suffer as a result.”
Dalsania appreciates how TEDx club provides an opportunity to educate the public through youth voices. “[We can] work together to do more than just have an idea, but to turn the idea into compelling argument that you can bring to an audience that might not have specialized topic or knowledge what you’re talking about, and to convey your vision to them in a short time span in a way that inspires them with hope and still brings the time to the issues we’re talking about,” Dalsania said.
Architect Carl Elefante once said, “The greenest building is…one that is already built.” Adithi Arvind, junior, uses this to emphasize the core of her TEDx talk, which is on living sustainably. “[Elefante’s] saying [that] rather than working [and] consuming so much material when you already have whatever you need to live your life with you, you [should] just stop buying stuff and live greener,” Arvind said.
Arvind emphasizes the importance of being eco-friendly in her own life. “I feel like [it has been] a big issue ever since the start, and honestly it’s just a pretty big part of my personality. I like to try [to] change my lifestyle and habits to be a more sustainable person and have less of an impact on the environment,” Arvind said.
Riley Shin, junior, views joining TEDx as a turning point in her high school experience. She connects her topic, which is the importance of taking risks in pursuit of one’s true passions, to her own life experience. “I started off high school [as a] standard academic weapon [but] I fell off that track, and recently, I’ve decided to pursue my own interests. So I wrote a book and I also want to go into acting, [and] I joined theater here and signed with an agency,” Shin said.
With this year’s TEDx event focusing on the vitality of youth voices, Shin sees the value in getting to share one’s passion with others. “I found TEDx to be such an interesting and unique opportunity, not only to perform and deliver a [presentation], but also to really develop your own voice through writing your own speech and researching an idea,” Shin said.
An avid listener of TED talks whether in class or on his YouTube page, Jalen Oben, junior, joined the club to step out of his comfort zone and get insight on what others are thinking. His speech revolved around the topic of stereotypes towards the younger generation. “Right now, as a junior kind of preparing for the college admission cycle, I always heard in the years prior people always saying that ‘all Gen Z’s do is just sit on the phone. They don’t actually have any applicable tasks for this world, they really don’t improve a lot, they don’t socialize, they are just to themselves.’ I don’t see it that way…so I want to speak about how Gen Zs are more than that and how the narrative that Gen Zs are lazy can be shifted,” Oben said.
Dalsania encourages any students who want the community to hear about a topic they are passionate about and meet other talented speakers to join TEDx. “Don’t think you have to be like an expert public speaker or like this super eloquent, young Shakespeare to do TEDx. I think everyone has a great idea and great ideas come from anywhere,” Dalsania said.
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