Fiona Brennan
Fiona Brennan is a Clinical Hypnotherapist
and founder of Ireland's premier, five-star online program The Positive Habit
designed to help people overcome negativity and anxiety. She is a Certified NLP
practitioner and mental health blogger based in Dublin. She helps people every
day to overcome anxiety, stress, and comfort eating to take control of their
minds and to reach their full positive potential. She holds a Higher Diploma in Clinical
Hypnosis and is a certified NLP practitioner. Her most recent training was in Positive Neuroplasticity with the
Neuropsychologist, Rick Hanson.
Fiona frequently appears in the national
media on issues of anxiety, emotional eating, and mental health and is fast
becoming known as an ambassador of positivity. She writes regularly for the acclaimed mental health website run by
Bressie, A Lust for Life.
Website: The Positive Habit
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FionaBrennanThePositiveHabit/
Twitter: @fionabrennan19
John is CEO and Co-Founder, ChannelSight. He is a technology entrepreneur and investor who made waves as a teenager, when he won the contract to build Ryanair’s ecommerce website. He went on to develop ground-breaking biometrics technology, showcased globally on the Discovery Channel and has since founded and built technology businesses in Europe, the US and Asia. He was named All-Ireland Young Entrepreneur of the Year in 2006 before being diagnosed as needing a kidney transplant. John was lucky enough to receive a life-saving kidney from his dad in 2010 and after a speedy recovery discovered new found energy, confidence and passion for entrepreneurship. John is currently focused on running ChannelSight, which helps brands to increase sales and optimise advertising performance, and has raised €5m from institutional investors since 2015.
John credits success in the face of
adversity to his resilience, which developed from the tough lessons that his
entrepreneurial career path taught him. John believes that fostering resilience
is one of the most important skills people can acquire to help them become and
remain successful at whatever it is they are passionate about. John seeks to
inspire and encourage others as a mentor and through his blog and social media
Twitter: @johnbeckett
Website: johnbeckett.com
LinkedIn: John Beckett
Mark Kelly
Mark Kelly’s podcast What I
Know Now introduces listeners to inspirational stories of leadership and
personal development. Set up in 2016, guests discuss the good and bad of their
journey to now and challenges interviewees to outline what they would tell
their 18-year-old self if they could have a coffee with them today. Featuring
polar explorers, elite runners, New York Times bestselling authors and
motivational speakers it aims to put leadership coaching in easy reach of
everyone.
Building on his background in recruitment Kelly believes that finding your path in life needs an openness to learn and the help to get there. He wants to inspire people to achieve their life goals through the stories of those who are further along the road. He is a director of an award-winning recruitment company and has won several international awards on a personal basis, including being chosen from 27,000 entrants as the No 1 Recruiter Award at the 2012 Recruiter Awards.
With an academic background in Business and a Masters in Strategic Management Planning from the Smurfit Business School he regularly hosts meet ups in Ireland and the UK.
In this talk, he will explain how after meeting 5,000 people within recruitment and his podcast guests he has discovered just how powerfully random acts of kindness can impact on happiness, productivity and positive transformations in society.Sean Lynch
OpenLitterMap.com is a web-based Citizen
Science game that enables anyone to map, reveal, communicate and resolve litter
(e.g. cigarette butts, plastic bottles etc.) anywhere on the globe using any
device- just log in! Users can submit geotagged images and tag litter to gain
experience points, Level Up and compete in multiple different leaderboards if
they choose to go public. In 2010 alone, it is estimated that between 8-20
million tonnes of plastic made its way into the ocean, which is expected to
rise to ~70 million tonnes annually by 2025 assuming current trends continue
(Jambeck et al. 2015). The most realistic way of counteracting this is by
opening up basic geospatial data (co-ordinates, time-stamp and litter data),
which OpenLitterMap facilitates by design. All data from OpenLitterMap is
mapped in hyper-spatial resolution, geospatially, quantitatively and
categorically analysed and free to download by anyone.
Website: Open Litter Map
LinkedIn: Sean Lynch
Michelle Stowe
Michelle
Stowe is a restorative practitioner, trainer and consultant. She is passionate
about creating well-being and happiness in the workplace; and particularly
interested in re-culturing schools and cultivating a restorative paradigm shift
that honours community and connection. Michelle also works with schools,
communities and organisations that need support in resolving conflict between
people. She is particularly interested in supporting others to turn towards
and see themselves in one another in times of conflict. Being involved in this
work allows her to feel that the life she is living is the same as the life
that wants to live in her.
Website: Connect RP
Twitter: @connect_rp @mstowerp
Shane Breslin
Shane
Breslin is a self-employed digital media and communications consultant, helping
individuals, businesses and organisations find their voice online and go from surviving
to thriving in the digital landscape. He is former Editorial Director of
Maximum Media, named in 2017 by the Financial Times as one of Europe's 250
fastest growing companies, and has managed digital communications for leading
Irish charities including the Irish Cancer Society and Age Action. He lives in
rural County Meath with his wife Lorraine, children Cara and Shay - and Mrs D,
the maddest and most maddening of Irish terriers.
Twitter: @shanebreslin
LinkedIn: Shane Breslin
Conor Heffernan
Conor is a current IRC and Universities Ireland History scholar at University College Dublin. Currently researching the role of exercise in Irish men and women’s lives from 1890 to 1939, Conor is deeply interested in the meanings attached to physical fitness by individuals and states alike. Outside the University, Conor runs physicalculturestudy.com, a history of fitness website, which has worked on collaborative projects with several different groups in the hope of raising people’s understandings of health and fitness. One of the most popular is a history of the treadmill animation with the education body, Ted-Ed.
Website: www.physicalculturestudy.com
Twitter: @PhysCstudy
Edel Browne
20 year old Edel Browne (centre) is the founder of Free Feet Medical,
which is developing a multi-award winning device designed to treat gait
freezing for people with Parkinson's disease. She is a past participant on the
STEMette's Outbox Incubator in London, a founding member of the Digital Youth
Council of Ireland, a past ambassador for The AAT Project and Nissan Generation
Next and Global Teen Leader for Three Dot Dash and the We Are Family
Foundation. Edel is also an alumnus of the London International Youth
Science Forum and has been named as one of 200 “Founders of The Future” at a
reception in No. 10, Downing St. Edel is currently Entrepreneur in
Residence at the NUI Galway Blackstone Launchpad and is also studying for a BSc
in Biotechnology at NUI Galway. She was listed among the Top 38 Women in Tech
by Technology Voice and named as Outstanding Young Person of the year by JCI
Galway in 2016. She is also a past Best Individual winner of the BT Young
Scientist and People's choice winner on the NDRC Health Tech Pre
Accelerator programme in association with eHealth
Ireland. Edel has also been named in the '30 under 30' lists by the
Sunday Business Post (2016 & 2017), and U Magazine as well as the '20 under
20' list by the journal.ie
in 2017. She was also accepted to the prestigious Ignite Programme in
Entrepreneurship & Management at the University of Cambridge in 2017.
Emer Halpenny
Emer set up her drama school in Stillorgan
in 1990, two years after giving a child up for adoption, and setting in motion
changes in her life that would still affect her thirty years later. The ethos
and drive of the school is to help young people realise their potential, build
confidence and become resilient in the face of everyday challenges. She also
runs the drama programme in Loreto College Foxrock. A writer, director and more
recently, co-director of Irish natural skincare company ANU, Emer continues to
try to instil confidence in people of all ages and walks of life. She featured
in TV3’s ‘Adoption Stories’ last year and explores the divergence of the roads
in her life in her blog b-earthmother.com
Website: B-earth Mother
Twitter: @Bearthmom
Facebook: B.earthmom
Padraig Hyland
Padraig Hyland is an audience engagement
specialist and works with people to help them engage and excite audiences
around their ideas. He has worked with TEDx Tallaght as a speaker coach
for a number of years and his passion is helping people find their authentic
voice. His company The Core Story has developed a unique process to enable business to communicate with an
audience. As well an extensive international business career he has also
worked a professional Stand-up Comedian.
Website: thecorestory.com
John Glynn
John Glynn is Gavin’s father and
the founder and Director of The Gavin Glynn Foundation. John's background is in Information
Security and I.T, and while Gavin was in treatment he spent all his spare time
reading medical articles and reaching out to other specialists from all corners
of the globe to find the best treatment options for Gavin. John has since built up a large network
of medical specialists from all over the world.
When Gavin passed in October 2014, John & Jayne knew that they must continue on and use their expertise and knowledge which they had gained while caring for Gavin to help other children with cancer and their families in Ireland and continue Gavin’s legacy. To date, The Gavin Glynn Foundation has helped 22 families from Ireland who need to travel overseas for specialist cancer treatment.
Twitter: @teamgavinglynn
Facebook: The Gavin Glynn Foundation
Website: The Gavin Glynn Foundation
Alice McCullogh
Alice McCullough
is an award-winning performance poet from Belfast. Her one-woman show 'Earth To
Alice' has gained critical acclaim in festivals across NI and she continues to
find new and engaging ways of sharing and showcasing spoken word, from her various
'Red Pill' collaborative projects to her 'Alice Fresco' outdoor performances,
her diverse adventures in poetry have taken her from performing on Belfast
benches to poetry bus tours to an upcoming performance in The Royal Albert
Hall. She has supported talents in poetry, comedy and music including Hollie
McNish, Katherine Ryan, Duke Special and Lemn Sissay, among others. Alice's
unique way with words has won her a presence on local and international radio
with poems commissioned for both TV (BBC The Arts Show) and radio (BBC
Talkback, BBC Arts Extra and U105).
Twitter: @earthtoalice
Facebook: Alice McCullough Poet
YouTube: Alice McCullough Playlist
Soundcloud: Alice McCullough
Niall Morahan
Niall Morahan is a service designer and strategist working between Dublin and London.
He helps people with complex problems to break them down and understand them, and people with big ideas to turn them into tangible and lasting changes to the world. He uses a variety of methods from design, social science and business.
In 2014 he set up a social enterprise called Project 42 which helps young people develop confidence, empathy, teamwork and creativity through designing the city of the future. In 2017, he brought Project 42 to Dublin in partnership with IT Tallaght, South Dublin Libraries, Foróige and the SFI.
Website: Niall Morahan
LinkedIn: Niall Morahan
Gerard Ryder
Gerard is a lecturer in Mechanical Engineering
at the Institute of Technology Tallaght. With interests in hydroponics,
robotics and sustainable energy he is currently one of lead investigators in
the Fiosracht project. A collaboration between the Institute of Technology,
Foroige and Tallaght Library. The project is funded by SFI under the Discover
programme. The principle aim of the the Fiosracht project is to develop a
discovery centre hosted in Tallaght library that will run a series of 1 day and
1 week camps in which children explore the issues that face society in the 21st
Century.
Website: Fiosracht
Twitter: Fiosracht
What is TEDx?
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TED has created a program called TEDx. TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. Our event is called TEDxBallyroanLibrary, where x = independently organized TED event. At our TEDxBallyroanLibrary event, TEDTalks video and live speakers will combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events, including ours, are self-organized.