IHE Graduate Student to Deliver TED Talk in March

IHE graduate student Ngozi Okafor is one of four University of Georgia students selected to deliver a TED talk at the 5th annual TEDxUGA event. She will speak on “The Power of Labels.”

Four UGA faculty and four alumni also have been selected to deliver talks.  

Registration opened last week for the popular event to be held from 1-5 p.m. on March 24 at the Classic Center in downtown Athens.

“I saw the audition call in a listserv for graduate and professional scholars,” said Okafor. “I got through the initial video submission audition, then an initial screening meeting with the team.”

After that she had to submit a sample speech and then audition with the selection committee. “I love TED,” said Okafor, who is the 2017 president of UGA’s Graduate and Professional Scholars group. “This is a dream come true.”

Okafor graduated from Brunel University in England with an honors degree in psychology and then earned a master’s in organizational and occupational psychology from the University of East London. Before joining IHE, she worked as a policy research fellow with Georgia State University and as adjunct faculty at Georgia Gwinnett College.

Her interests in higher education span issues in comparative higher education and factors that influence access, persistence and success for female graduate students. She has traveled to 34 countries for her work and research activities exploring education systems and culture.

Okafor currently serves as a graduate teaching assistant in the Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities (CURO), a part of the Honors program. She works with undergraduates in the Honors program, teaching them to effectively convey the impact of their research activities to diverse audiences.

For more information about TEDxUGA 2017, see TEDxUGA.com.