TEDxGVAGrad

Speakers

Speakers may not be confirmed. Check the event website for the latest lineup.

• Bahar Sharifi

  Bahar is currently doing her master’s in anthropology and sociology at the Graduate Institute. She was born and raised in Iran, and has always been interested in Persian and Middle Eastern music. What she really likes about Iranian classical music is how it expresses history and tells stories. Since music engages our senses, it allows us to connect to history and stories and to truly feel them.

• CERN Dramatic Arts Club

  The CERN Dramatic Arts Club is an all-encompassing umbrella for self-expression, to train stage and public speaking skills.

• Damien O’Brien

  Damien O’Brien is the founder of The Mental Health Association Switzerland and Coffee Foundation, a global award-winning mental health awareness and suicide-prevention movement. Diagnosed with bipolar disorder Damien has transformed profound personal pain into purpose, championing vulnerability as a superpower and reclaiming the word “crazy” to fight back against the mental health crisis.Unlike traditional experts, Damien speaks from lived experience — removing the masks we all wear to hide vulnerability, using raw honesty, humor, and courage to connect with everyone from young people on the streets to CEOs in boardrooms, free from mental-health washing.His collaborations with world-class artists and creators have earned global recognition, including the 2026 Givsly Impact Award Gold in New York for Campaigns With Conviction, World Brand Design Society Silver, and Brand Impact Awards Bronze.

• Elena Servettaz

  Elena Servettaz is an investigative journalist, author, and documentary filmmaker with over 25 years of experience in international media. A graduate of Moscow State University and the French Press Institute in Paris, she has worked as a television and radio host in France and Russia. Based in Switzerland, she is a Foreign Affairs journalist at SWI swissinfo.ch. Elena leads cross-border investigations, covers international relations, and conducts deeply personal interviews on power, repression, and resistance. She has also taught journalism and communications and is the mother of three children.

• Francesco Femia

  Francesco Femia, a versatile musician, he performs as a soloist, in chamber music with the Metronome Quintet and with orchestras such as the Venice Chamber Orchestra, the Rossini Orchestra of Pesaro and the Geneva Chamber Orchestra. After completing his Bachelor's degree (2021) with Elisa Cozzini and Vincent Lucas in Paris, he joins the Master Concert’s program at the Geneva University of Music (Michel Bellavance) in 2024. He participates in international masterclasses (Paolo Taballione, Andrea Manco, Karl Heinz Schütz).

• Gargi Manek

  Gargi Manek is a master’s student in the interdisciplinary MINT programme, specialising in Human Rights and Humanitarianism. She explores how international legal frameworks function in contexts of conflict and crisis, building on her academic background in International Relations from King’s College London. Having grown up as a third culture kid, Gargi brings lived cross-cultural experience to her work, shaping her interest in the intersection of law, identity, and humanitarian response across diverse global contexts.

• Jonah Anderson

  Jonah Anderson is a Swiss flow artist specialised in prop dancing from Nyon, VD.

• Leonilda Renaldo

  Leonilda Renaldo coaches aspiring leaders who've mastered every language except their own. Raised by Spanish-speaking parents who spoke anyway – imperfectly, defiantly – she learned that authenticity outlasts approval. Now she plants this idea in global workplaces: your rough edges prove you're irreplaceable. Working at the intersection of emotional intelligence and personal leadership, Leonilda helps professionals hold an impossible truth – belonging and authenticity rarely arrive together. So we choose authenticity. We speak imperfectly in a world demanding perfection. We speak anyway.

• Mark Moser

  Mark Moser is a lecturer, consultant, and bridge-builder working at the crossroads of intercultural communication, conflict transformation, and security. He teaches at several universities and advises organisations with a strong focus on communication and intercultural competence in modern policing and public institutions. Former Secretary General of an international health organisation, he brings over 15 years of leadership experience across Europe, Asia, and Africa. Raised in Papua New Guinea, Mark now lives in Switzerland and Southeast Asia, navigating cultures as both home and horizon.

• Morgane Bascle

  Morgane Bascle is a student at the Graduate Institute and co-founder of OxFounders Global, a non-profit supporting talented founders in emerging markets by connecting them to funding and global networks. She has worked with hundreds of startups across ten countries and advised governments on innovation strategy, with her work featured in national media in multiple countries. She now focuses on how Europe can strengthen its own capacity for growth and innovation.

• Olivia Bornyi

  Olivia Bornyi is a Canadian student driven by a commitment to shaping resilient peace through positive narratives and multilateralism. She is currently the President of Peacebuilding Initiative, driving forward the #YPS Agenda by connecting aspiring peacebuilders with seasoned professionals. Olivia is a firm believer in the transformative power of communication, having spoken at Geneva Peace Week’s Opening Ceremony: ‘Youth are Generation Now’. She is excited to join the 2026 TEDxGVAGrad lineup and share her insights.

• Vesper Junqueira

  Vesper Junqueira is a Brazilian lawyer, climate justice advocate, and first-year MINT student specializing in Environment and Sustainability. Their work explores the intersection of climate justice and queer justice, asking how climate change reveals the myth of borders and binaries and what it means to belong in a warming world. Drawing on decolonial thought, art, and storytelling, Vesper examines how imagination itself can become a form of resistance in times of ecological crisis.

• Vivian Ejezie

  Vivian Ejezie is a communications professional with a background in gender, media, and human rights. She holds a Master’s degree in International History and Politics from the Graduate Institute, Geneva, where her research explored how media shapes perceptions of women and gender-based violence in Nigeria. Vivian has worked with diverse international organisations including ICRC, UNFPA, OHCHR and IUCN. She is the founder of Days of Future Past, an annual poetry event in Geneva focused on connection and healing and she volunteers with Youth Hut Foundation in their work to empower teenagers with leadership skills needed to navigate adulthood.

• Vrinda Kapoor

  I’m Vrinda, a MINT Migration student from London. I think a lot about how people navigate uncertain worlds, and music has always been a big part of how I explore those ideas. I’m drawn to alt-rock and indie for their rawness, and I perform them on acoustic sets, sharing songs that matter to me and hoping they connect with whoever is listening.

• Wahid Majrooh

  Wahid Majrooh, MD, MSc, MA, MAS is a global health leader and former Minister of Public Health of Afghanistan, who led the country’s health system through COVID-19 and conflict emergency. Shaped by firsthand experience of crisis, he founded the Afghanistan Center for Health and Peace Studies in Geneva and serves as an Executive-in-Residence Fellow at GCSP and an Academic Fellow at the Geneva Humanitarian Studies Center. His work focuses on global health diplomacy, health system strengthening, geopolitics, politics of global health and leadership in fragile settings.