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TEDxCU, CU Â鶹ӰԺ’s own independently organized, student-run TED event, presents "On the Contrary" on Saturday, April 4, in Macky Auditorium. The 2026 event will challenge attendees to reconsider the tension between opposites—not as conflict but as connection.

Featured speakers

• Doris Yuen: Owner of MAKFam Denver, a nontraditional Chinese restaurant that advocates for MSG and breaks down the misconceptions surrounding it.
• Dr. Vik Bebarta: Chair of Emergency Medicine at CU Anschutz who focuses on how innovations in military medicine can be applied to improve patient care.
• Benji Billman: Mathematics teacher who reframes mathematics as a practical application for the everyday person.
• Ben Forman: Former screen addict who will guide through navigating the digital age by helping students reclaim attention, emotional well-being and childhood.
• Leo Heuring: CU Â鶹ӰԺ student who designs and builds open-source robots. Delivering his talk with Corndog, his robotic dog, he will explore the meaning that humans convey to their robots.
• Aimee Bernard: Immunologist, medical educator and science communicator devoted to sharing the importance of spreading accessible science.
• Kya Leptrone: CU Â鶹ӰԺ psychology student and stuttering activist who challenges the notion that the goal of communication should be fluency.

'On the Contrary'

"On the Contrary" challenges us to reconsider the tension between opposites not as conflict but as connection. Just as we don’t know light without shadow, or sound without silence, it is through juxtaposition that meaning emerges.Ìý

The theme explores the beauty of contradiction and opposition where tensions like chaos and order, friction and flow, and comedy and tragedy, remind us that opposing viewpoints are often two halves of a deeper truth. In duality, we can find dialogue, rather than division.

Â鶹ӰԺ TEDx

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience.Ìý

At a TEDx event, TED Talks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where the X means an independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized (subject to certain rules and regulations).

TEDxCU is independently organized and a student-run initiative of CU Â鶹ӰԺ. Support for this events translates into support for the students who run this event. Additionally, each talk featured at TEDxCU has the chance to become an official TED Talk. This brings incredible press and attention to the speaker (and in this case, the school) that is featured.