In this moment, women’s leadership is more important than ever.

This is an uncertain time. And yet, amid the environmental, political, and economic challenges confronting us at every level, now is the time to engage.

Join TEDxFSCJWomen for Fearless, a virtual event featuring prerecorded talks from TEDWomen 2020 as well as a live and locally organized line-up of speakers. This year’s TEDWomen conference will showcase venues from around the world, including Lagos, Nigeria, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, Montreal, Canada, Colombo, Sri Lanka, and Sydney, Australia.

After screening select talks from TEDWomen 2020, our live speakers will take the virtual stage. Hosted by Action News Jax anchor and reporter, Lorena Inclán, our speakers include:

Ms. Shawana Brooks, Founder of 6 Ft Away: Public Art Agency
Dr. Diana L. Greene, Superintendent, Duval County Public Schools
Dr. C. Nicole Mason, Ph.D., President and CEO, Institute for Women’s Policy Research
Dr. Claire Thomas, Desk Officer for Botswana and Namibia, U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Southern Africa Affairs

Join us as we explore how women are leading us into the future at the crossroads of the local and the global, the national and international.

This virtual event is free and open to the public, but all attendees must register

TEDxFSCJWomen 2020 will be held Saturday, November 14, 7-9 p.m. Online check-in will begin at 6:50 p.m.

Shawana Brooks

Shawana Brooks is a literary artist and avid public speaker for her various roles as a curator focused on the relationship between artists and their communities. Her art revolves around personal storytelling infused with issues of social justice. She is the founder of a public arts agency that strives to amplify Black artists through representation and storytelling. Brooks’ work has been highlighted in the national media (“Morning Edition: NPR”), and she was selected as the first official curator for the Jacksonville Public Library. Recognized by her peers, she received the 2018 Robert Arleigh White Award for Artist Advocacy from the Cultural Council of Greater Jacksonville as the first Black person to win the award. Two years later, Shawana made history again winning the council's highest honor, the Helen Lane Founder Award.

Diana L. Greene

Dr. Diana L. Greene began her tenure as Superintendent of Duval County Public Schools (DCPS), the 20th largest school district in the nation, on July 1, 2018. Prior to becoming a superintendent in Duval County, Dr. Greene served as Superintendent and Deputy Superintendent of Instructional Services in Manatee County. During her 33-year career as an educator, she has spent time as a teacher, assistant principal and principal as well as in curriculum development, staff development and senior executive leadership. On a personal note, Dr. Greene’s father served in the Air Force, and she grew up living in locations all over the United States and abroad. She is married to James Greene, an independent financial advisor and retired Navy veteran; they have two sons, Aldon and Joshua.

C. Nicole Mason

As one of the nation’s foremost intersectional researchers and scholars, Dr. C. Nicole Mason brings a fresh perspective and a wealth of experience to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR). For the past two decades, Dr. Mason has spearheaded research on issues relating to economic security, poverty, women’s issues and entitlement reforms; policy formation and political participation among women, communities of color and youth; and racial equity. Prior to IWPR, Dr. Mason was the executive director of the Women of Color Policy Network at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, the nation’s only research and policy center focused on women of color at a nationally ranked school of public administration. She is also an inaugural Ascend Fellow at the Aspen Institute in Washington, D.C.

Claire Thomas

Claire Thomas is a Foreign Service Officer with the U.S. Department of State, and she is currently Desk Officer in the Africa Bureau, Office of Southern African Affairs covering Botswana and Namibia. Previously, Claire served as Vice Consul in Chennai, India and as Environment, Science, Technology and Health Officer in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. Before becoming a diplomat, Claire was a Product Manager in the software and analytics sector in Silicon Valley. She holds a Ph.D. in Linguistics and a B.A. in Russian and Linguistics from the University of Lund in Sweden. Originally from the suburbs of Boston, Claire went to high school in Brooklyn, NY and is married with two grown daughters and a teenage son.

Host

Lorena Inclán

Lorena Inclán, reporter and weekend anchor of Action News Jax This Morning, joined the Action News Jax team in 2012. Before moving to Jacksonville, Lorena was a multimedia journalist for Univision Orlando. Lorena began her broadcast journalism career in the Texas Panhandle. While there, she was the only bilingual anchor, reporter and producer for KFDA NewsChannel10 and its sister station, Telemundo Amarillo. She got her start in the TV industry by working behind the scenes as a camera operator and studio technician at WTVJ NBC6 in South Florida. The daughter of Cuban immigrants, Lorena was born and raised in Miami where she attended the University of Miami and earned a Bachelor of Science in Communication.

The salon was held Friday, November 2, at FSCJ-Deerwood, from 9-10:30 a.m.

The power of innovation reaches beyond mere technology. At its core, innovation is about questioning conventional wisdom, disrupting existing markets, and challenging theoretical assumptions. Innovation requires us to create new networks among people, places, and ideas, and to overcome the fear that inevitably attends change.

Join TEDxFSCJ for Fearless Innovation, a salon exploring how innovators in Central Asia and across Northeast Florida are defying the frontiers of the familiar. In collaboration with the U.S. Embassy in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, we will use live video streaming to connect thought leaders in Tajikistan with innovators located right here in Jacksonville. Co-hosted by FSCJ student Lauren Hutchison, our morning will feature two local innovators, Shiva Robotics Academy founder Kalai Sankar and Web.com Chief Technology Officer Jane Landon. Joining us from Tajikistan will be startup guru and salon co-host Parviz Jamalov, cybersecurity expert and social entrepreneur Abdurahmon Abdurashidov, IT project manager and English lecturer Nasiba Mirpochoeva, and financial technology leader Abdullo Kurbanov.

Drawing on their extensive experience challenging the bounds of technology and culture, our speakers will discuss how transformative thinking begins with innovative educators, how technology functions as a catalyst to local and global change, and how technological evolution is changing the way we live as well as the way we do business.

Photos from the Jacksonville Location

Photos from the Dushanbe Location

Speakers

Kalai Sankar

Kalai is the founder of Jacksonville’s Shiva Robotics Academy, an institution imparting robotics education to students in grades K-8. As a Carnegie Mellon Certified Robotics instructor and professional LEGO educator, she has introduced afterschool robotics programs in eighteen Title 1 schools. By partnering with organizations like Communities in Schools, Renaissance Jax, and Girl Scouts of Gateway Council, she has helped hundreds of Florida students compete in tournaments as far away as Houston and Costa Rica. Kalai is the recipient of Florida’s Best Robotics Coach award and Jacksonville Business Journal Innovator in Education Award, and her Shiva Robotics camps have been featured in the Florida Times-Union, Folio, and Buzz TV. Sankar holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Fatima College in Madurai, India.

Abdurahmon Abdurashidov

Abdu is a technology, innovation, and social-outreach change agent. He is the founder and CEO of Durandesh, a Tajik tech-startup company specializing in internet-related services, cybersecurity products, and software engineering. He also founded Durud, a Tajik Customer Relations Management project. Recently, he joined the board of directors at Alif Academy, a fast-growing IT institution in Tajikistan. Abdu has worked as an IT engineer at several institutions, including the microlending firm IMON International, the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Aalto University of Finland, and the Swiss subsidiary, Nukrafom. Lastly, he is the founder and president of AIESEC, Khujand, an international nonprofit that provides youth with leadership opportunities, cross-cultural internships, and volunteer exchange experiences. Abdurashidov holds a bachelor’s degree in information technology from Khujand Polytechnic Institute.

Jane L. Landon

Jane is Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Web.com. Prior to joining Web.com in 2010, she was Deputy Commissioner and Chief Information Officer for the New York City Department of Finance. Her past experience includes Business and Technology leadership positions at Microsoft, where she was General Manager .net Market Development and Chief Information Officer for Public Sector Business Systems Information Technology, as well as Institutional CIO Prudential Insurance of America and General Manager Global Corporate Systems at The Bankers Trust Company. Jane is also on the Board of Directors of STEM2Hub of Northeast Florida. Landon holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration from SUNY Fredonia in Fredonia, New York.

Nasiba Mirpochoeva

Nasiba is a project manager at MicroInvest, MCF and an English lecturer at Khujand State University in Tajikistan. Dedicated to empowering women, youth, and vulnerable communities through the arts, business, and environmental training, she is a Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant alumna, a George Mason University Community Leadership Institute alumna, and a recipient of multiple U.S. government grants. She has also participated in the Central Asia Teachers of English Conference, the Central Eurasian Studies Conference, and Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages. Mirpochoeva holds a cum laude diploma in English and German languages from Khujand State University and a master’s degree in finance and credit.

Abdullo Kurbanov

Abdullo is a financial-technology and banking leader. He is the co-founder and CEO of Alif Capital, one of the fastest growing fin-tech organizations in Tajikistan. Alif Capital brought key innovations to Tajikistan’s banking sector by introducing interest-free loans, offering revenue- sharing deposits, and adopting the non-conventional strategy of building key banking software in-house. Abdullo is also co-founder of Somon.tj, a classifieds website that has become the most visited local website in Tajikistan, and he is co-founder of Peshraft, a charitable fund focusing on education. He has worked in private equity, investment banking, and consulting in London, Moscow, and Ulaanbaatar. Kurbanov holds a bachelor’s degree in management from Boğaziçi University in Turkey and a master’s degree in finance from the London School of Economics.

Hosts

Lauren Hutchison

Lauren is a project manager at Web.com and an honor student in the IT Management Bachelor of Science program at Florida State College at Jacksonville. In April 2018, Lauren spoke at TEDxFSCJ’s annual conference; in her TEDx talk, she explains how she discovered non- technical ways to apply agile concepts to our lives outside the workplace. Hutchison is owner of the blog womenwholovetech.com, an aspiring entrepreneur, a member of STARS Computing Corp, a computer club at FSCJ, and a volunteer at St. Johns Riverkeeper, an environmental nonprofit. She holds an AA degree from FSCJ.

Parviz Jamalov

Parviz is a Communications and Projects Manager at the British Embassy Dushanbe. As a community leader with extensive experience in public speaking and media marketing, he was the first to bring TEDx to Tajikistan, organizing TEDxDushanbe in 2012. Inspired by his college studies in the U.S., he spearheaded several youth-oriented projects in Tajikistan, including a Youth Peacemaking Leadership Conference, a Model UN Conference, and an English Community Theater initiative. Parviz pioneered the concept of business pitching in Tajikistan, hosting its national pitching competition, Startup Choihona, as well as emceeing the G5 Startup Forum. For his community service work, he received the Universal Peace Federation’s Youth Ambassador for Peace award. Jamalov holds a bachelor’s degree in Journalism and Mass Communications from the Russian-Tajik Slavonic University in Dushanbe.

TEDxFSCJ Women: Fearless