The Evans Churchill neighborhood became a part of the TEDx program in December. TEDxEvansChurchill will kick off by hosting a live stream of a day of the TED conference at FilmBar on Feb. 27.
TED consists of talks and conferences involving innovative, creative speakers with the goal of sharing ideas worth spreading. TEDx, similarly, is intended to bring the TED experience to local communities and involves showing TEDTalks videos alongside live speakers and, in some cases, opportunities like live streaming next week’s conference.
Kevin Rille, president of the Evans Churchill Community Association, applied for the TEDxEvansChurchill license and was granted it Dec. 7. Rille said he hopes to organize two events this year: the live stream on Feb. 27 and a shorter, ticketed live event with local speakers once the summer is over. However, Rille said, he is still in the process of discovering exactly what being part of TEDx involves.
“It’s a fun challenge for me, because I don’t know what I’m getting into, either,” Rille said.
The live stream on Feb. 27 is an “easy first step” to get TEDxEvansChurchill on its feet, Rille said. Live streaming the conference is much less work to set up and organize than a live TEDx event and serves as a “great introduction” to the TEDx program.
The TED conference live stream event is free to the public. No ticketing has been set up, though you can RSVP through the Facebook events page, Rille said.
The live stream event at FilmBar will show the second day of the conference, which runs from 8:30 a.m. to 6:45 p.m. There are four sessions – Disrupt!, Dream!, Create! and Sustain! – each of which runs an hour and 45 minutes. The sessions involve a variety of speakers, from a yo-yo champion to a nuclear scientist.
While the TED rules state that a TEDx event may not be used to make money, the event may be sponsored. Changing Hands Bookstore will be sponsoring the live stream, Rille said. Partnership with bookstores is encouraged in the TED program.
Cindy Dach, co-owner of Changing Hands, said the bookstore will be sponsoring the event with marketing and support. TED meets the mission of Changing Hands, Dach said.
“Bookstores are about ideas and people coming around ideas, and this completely personifies that,” she said.
Event organizers are still searching for sponsors for the live stream. Dorina Bustamante, a community developer in downtown Phoenix, said she is dealing with sponsorships for the TED live stream. She is also helping with operations and filling the house.
“It’s a big thing for most creatives, entrepreneurs, people of the new economy to participate in and be inspired by TED,” Bustamante said.
The TED motto is “ideas worth spreading,” and it is the spread of ideas that people like Dach, Bustamante and Rille are excited to see with the rise of TEDxEvansChurchill.
“(This is) a challenge to the neighborhood to say, ‘All right, let’s stretch ourselves a little bit,’” Rille said.
Both Bustamante and Rille have high hopes for the future of TEDxEvansChurchill. Rille is hoping to develop an ongoing legacy of Evans Churchill TEDx events and said he hopes it will continue for years to come. He wants to build Evans Churchill as a community onto a bigger stage, Rille said. Bustamante agreed.
“We’re part of the igniters, if you will,” Bustamante said. “(Rille) is the match that lit that flame.”
The development of TEDxEvansChurchill also provides support for the work of the community, Bustamante said. She said that the neighborhood encompassed everything that TED is focused on.
“I think it’s more validating than anything,” she said. “The people in this neighborhood have been walking the walk and talking the talk for longer than most people recognize.”
Contact the reporter at molly.bilker@asu.edu
