2020 Speakers

NISHA TALAGALA

AI Literacy: What is it and why do we need it?

Nisha Talagala is the CEO and founder of Pyxeda AI. She is also the founder of AIClub.World which is bringing AI Literacy to K-12 students and individuals worldwide.

Nisha has significant experience in introducing technologies like Artificial Intelligence to new learners from students to professionals. Previously, Nisha co-founded ParallelM which pioneered the MLOps practice of managing Machine Learning in production for enterprises - acquired by DataRobot. Nisha is a recognized leader in the operational machine learning space, having also driven the USENIX Operational ML Conference, the first industry/academic conference on production AI/ML. Nisha was previously a Fellow at SanDisk and Fellow/Lead Architect at Fusion-io, where she worked on innovation in non-volatile memory technologies and applications.

Nisha has more than 20 years of expertise in enterprise software development, distributed systems, technical strategy and product leadership. She has worked as technology lead for server flash at Intel - where she led server platform non-volatile memory technology development, storage-memory convergence, and partnerships. Prior to Intel, Nisha was the CTO of Gear6, where she designed and built clustered computing caches for high performance I/O environments.

Nisha earned her PhD at UC Berkeley where she did research on clusters and distributed systems. Nisha holds 71 patents in distributed systems and software, over 25 refereed research publications, is a frequent speaker at industry and academic events, and is a contributing writer to Forbes and other publications.

TANIA SAFI

A Reason For Being & The Judgement For Reason

Tania Safi is an Arabic-Australian video journalist and rights activist. Her family has Palestinian, Syrian, Egyptian, and Lebanese roots, prompting her to move to Tripoli at the age of 19. While she was there, a civil war broke out. In this time and under curfew, Tania drew in order to catalogue the traumatic events that followed and once able to leave, turned those drawings into an animation, ‘Trab Laus’. The film won first place at the United Nations Plural+ Film Festival, sending her to New York, and was the catalyst behind the beginning of her career as a visual storyteller.

Tania has since worked as a producer for The Chaser, The Roast (ABC), BuzzFeed, SBS and Happy Media. In 2012, she received City Hubb’s Sydney’s Best Filmmaker award and in 2015 she took her talents to BuzzFeed in Sydney and Los Angeles as a senior video producer; shooting, producing, hosting and editing hundreds of videos for their cross-platforms, eventually co-creating their now viral page Bring Me. In 2018 she relocated from LA to London and travelled the world creating digital content and documentary shorts.

Tania moved back to Lebanon in 2019 and founded a self-funded documentary series called Shway Shway (meaning “slowly” or “ little by little” in Arabic), which featured fearless women, NGOs, change-makers and community groups across Lebanon who are helping better the world. Two projects specifically documented stories of the LGBTQIA+ Arabic community - outside the stereotypes and only just the challenges. In 2019, Tania was a host at the United Nations Global Forum in 2019 New York and has since worked with SBS Sydney as a journalist and at Happy Media as their Head of Video. Her passion for education and entertainment through accessible and innovative video has been a great gift to our community and the world.

CHINMAYI BALUSU

Pick Your Brain: Neuroscience for All

Chinmayi Balusu is an undergraduate sophomore studying neuroscience and medical humanities at Columbia University. She is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of the international nonprofit organization Simply Neuroscience, which works to foster students' interdisciplinary interests in the brain through neuroscience and psychology education, outreach, and awareness.

Chinmayi is also a student researcher contributing to cognitive neuroscience and traumatic brain injury research; she has previously been involved in biomedicine and neurodegenerative diseases work, specifically in investigating the effects of a longevity compound named rapamycin on brain tissue in mice. She is passionate about youth science communication, women in STEM advocacy, and mentorship.

Chinmayi is an International Science and Engineering Fair finalist, the California Science and Engineering Fair's 2019 Student of the Year, USA National Brain Bee competitor, three-time National History Day California finalist, and Presidential Volunteer Service Award and Daily Point of Light Award recipient for community service efforts. In her free time, she enjoys practicing taekwondo, gardening, exploring nature trails, discovering new music, and watching old Telugu films with her family.

SOPHIA GOTTFRIED

Vita Activa: Bringing Work to Life

Sophia Gottfried is a Harker senior known best as a philosopher-poet. She is Philosophy Club President, HELM co-editor, and the treasurer for the writers advocate. In the past, she has had writing published in Philosophy Now, Questions, and on the Society of Classical Poets' website. Currently, she is working on researching Nietzsche’s influence on anarchism for her Mitra project, as well as planning a philosophy conference.