Theme: from knowledge to wisdom

TEDxYouth@ISPrague is a signature half-day event, curated by, organised by, and featuring international high-school students and select guests. Featuring a vast range of ideas, talks are suitable for mature youth and adults, and open to the public. This year's TEDx is the International School of Prague's 5th annual event. Previous years' talk playlists can be found on the TEDx Youtube channel under TEDxYouth@ISPrague. Videos of this year's talks will be available online soon.

International School of Prague
Nebušucka 700
Prague, Praha 6, 16400
Czech Republic

Ajla Obradović

journalist, digital media editor

In the era of deepfake, Photoshop and special effects, we’re learning we can’t trust everything we see. We urgently need reliable news about our complex world, but how do we verify digital content? What are the best strategies to investigate suspicious information? And how do the pros do it? Ajla Obradović is a journalist and digital media editor at Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. In this TEDx talk, she shares her professional insights about fake news, misinterpretation, and how much effort we actually need to invest to stay well informed in our rapidly changing world.

Alaeddin Janid

humanitarian activist

After fleeing his war-ravaged homeland, Syria, Alaeddin began the difficult work of building a new life in the Netherlands. Having witnessed firsthand the plight of refugee children in temporary camps in Greece, he was determined to provide them with support. But with almost no resources himself, what could he offer them? Alaeddin is president of Happy Caravan, the organisation he founded, which provides education, creative expression, and other forms of support to refugee children in several locations in Greece. He works with a growing team of activists and educators - including student volunteers - from many parts of the world.

Albín Sybera

journalist, PhD candidate

What has to happen to bind strangers into that thing we call a “nation”? What role do stories play, and does it matter how true they are? Using the Czech Republic as a case study, Albín provokes us to reflect on the ways we all participate in constructing our own national identities. Albín Sybera is an International School of Prague graduate from 2003. He completed undergraduate and postgraduate studies in Canada and the UK. He is now a freelance journalist and is working towards his PhD at the University of Ljubljana, Slovenia, where he lives with his wife and three children.

Banu Mammadli

cultural critic, feminist thinker, student

Fairytales, legends, myths. The familiar, timeless stories children grow up hearing provide their earliest - and possibly most enduring - beliefs about how the world is. But might adults unknowingly be harming their children in the process? In this provocative talk, Banu challenges the gender stereotypes that some classic narratives perpetuate, and asks us to take an honest look at the implicit messages in our own culture’s stories. Banu’s heritage is Azerbaijani. She lives and studies in Prague, where her school community knows her as an avid writer and debater on a variety of contemporary socio-cultural issues.

Bety Pechačová

aspiring linguist, researcher, student

Praise and compliments are familiar features of speech, especially in schools where positive motivation is valued. But few of us give much thought to the vocabulary we use when complimenting others. A careful analysis of the language of compliments can help ensure that our words achieve maximum positive impact. Bety has lived in and around Prague her whole life, attending various Czech schools before coming to the International School of Prague in 10th grade. The ideas in this talk were inspired by Bety's applied linguistics project from 2018.

Chih Tong Lee

volunteer, critical thinker, student

Chih Tong firmly believes in the value and transformative power of service. Her talk is inspired by her experiences volunteering with various local and international organizations. Reflecting on her role as a guilty contributor to the ‘voluntourism industry’, Chih Tong asks how she might gain control of her service experiences. She examines the impacts of voluntourism, and calls for a more authentic approach. A Chinese-born international student, Chih Tong’s has been shaped by her many experiences visiting dramatically different parts of the world. After completing high school, she hopes to continue volunteering, creating a social ripple effect wherever she lives.

Colleen Knutson

psychologist, counsellor, educator

Many young people today face serious mental health challenges, especially anxiety. Drawing on experiences from 20 years of work in education, Colleen encourages us to address anxiety more effectively, including confronting the stigma that still prevents some young people from receiving the support they need. Colleen is the school psychologist at the International School of Prague. For the past 20 years, she has studied, taught and practiced psychology in the Czech Republic, in both Czech and English, and has presented at various international conferences. Student well-being is her number one priority.

Elizabeth Perry

teacher, maker, unmaker, remaker

“Fabricando fabricamur - in making, we make ourselves,” wrote the philosopher Comenius centuries ago. What can we learn from making things? What would it mean to make - or remake - ourselves? A life-long maker, educator, and tinkerer, Elizabeth Perry’s formal background is in literature and writing. She has been a community organizer, college professor, education consultant for Google, fellow at Carnegie Mellon’s Studio for Creative Inquiry, and has been teaching in international schools since 2012. These days you will usually find her in the International School of Prague’s Idea Lab, helping people go back and forth between the world of stuff and the world of bits.

Michael Žantovský

author, diplomat, politician

Thirty years ago, many people thought that the end of the Cold War represented the final victory of liberal democracy and marked the end of history. Thirty years later, all bets are off. What do we need to do to recover hope and a sense of purpose? Michael Žantovský is a Czech diplomat, politician, writer, translator, and former spokesman to President Václav Havel. In 1989 he was a founding member and spokesman of Civic Forum, an umbrella organization that coordinated the overthrow of Czechoslovakia’s communist regime. He served as Ambassador to the United States, Israel and the United Kingdom. Michael is now the Executive Director of the Václav Havel Library in Prague. He shares this TEDx talk on the 30th anniversary of the fall of Eastern European communism.

Nelly Bartakova

aspiring ecologist, student

Through the media, we occasionally learn about oil spills and see dramatic images of the damage they cause to the environment. In this talk, Nelly examines a less familiar side of the story: the methods currently in use to clean up oil spills. How effective are they really? Born in the Czech Republic, a landlocked country, Nelly has become increasingly curious about what really happens out on the open sea. An environmental research project in her final year of secondary school became the catalyst for this TEDx talk.

Nicole Madi

musician, composer

Nicole is a Czech-Lebanese singer, songwriter, and pianist. Her debut as a composer and performer happened in 2004, in the same theatre as this TEDx event. Fifteen years later, she performs an original, deeply personal song, Believe It, inspired by a close friend who passed away long before his time. Nicole says, “The loss of a dear one goes beyond the spectrum of human understanding. Nevertheless, we have been given the gift of expressing the intangible through music.” Nicole performs, composes and teaches music in Prague. She graduated from the International School of Prague in 2010.

Róbert Bohát

biologist, cognitive linguist, educator

Metaphors are more than superficial ornaments of language; they influence what and how we think, feel and learn. In this research-based talk, Róbert argues that learning metaphors have a significant impact on student motivation, engagement and success in school. One of the most multilingual people in the Czech Republic, Róbert is currently building a Learning Metaphor Toolkit to empower students, based on more than 15 years as a teacher in international education. As a biologist, Róbert is also interested in the neurobiological aspects of cognitive metaphors, cognition and learning. His PhD research, in association with Charles University in Prague, combines cognitive and corpus linguistic approaches to language and learning.

William Schönfeld

beatboxer, musician, student

Beatboxing is more than just odd noise-making; it’s a unique form of music with unlimited possibilities. Anyone can can do it, just about anywhere. All we need is our mouth, a vivid imagination, and some courage to explore. Some years ago, William struggled with fluency and self-expression. Beatboxing proved to be a bridge to confidence and control, as well as a creative outlet and a fun way to banish boredom. William is now in his final year as a student at the International School of Prague.