The power of two
Two international school students take their TED-inspired conferences to India with the aim of motivating teenagers
No one could have predicted the doors Anna Zhou and Karen Lee Mei-ling have opened with their Ndoto conferences. Not only are students at their own school, Hong Kong International School, looking at their futures differently, but so are students in India. And it may not stop there.
Both Year 11 students at HKIS, Anna, 18, and Karen, 17, hope their vision (that's what "ndoto" means in Swahili) will also help other young people broaden their visions about the world around them.
Karen says she thought Anna was crazy when she first mentioned the idea. "The whole thing was Anna's idea," Karen says. "On our MTR ride after the TEDxYouth talk, she said: 'Why don't we do a TED ourselves?'"
But because they couldn't meet TED's licensing conditions, they gave up the idea of establishing a local chapter. That's how the first Ndoto Conference was born.
"When we started this in 2011, we were under 18. TED's licensing conditions [stipulate] that talks organised by those aged below 18 should have no more than 100 people including volunteers, attendees and speakers. We wanted to get more people to attend," says Anna.