Behind the Red Dot.

On October 7th, TEDxVictoria returns, this time at the UVic Farquhar Auditorium. This year’s lineup doesn't stay in its lane, and that's exactly the point.

This year’s theme is Uncharted. It's a word that goes beyond easy definition, and that's why it matters. It isn't just about the unknown. It's about what it takes to move through it: curiosity, courage, and the willingness to ask questions long before the answers come into view.

The 12 speakers taking the stage come from wildly different worlds. A poet and a medical physicist. A coroner and a YouTuber. An astronomer searching for life beyond Earth. What connects them isn't a shared field or a common credential. It's a shared condition. Each of them has had to work without a map.

Join us for a day of ideas that challenge assumptions, spark curiosity, and inspire new ways of thinking. Get your tickets today. Here's who you'll hear from.

Mapping the human side of new technology

Some of this year's speakers are wrestling with the tools reshaping how we think, create, and care for one another.

Faraz Forghan-Parast, an Iranian-Canadian poet, educator, and doctoral researcher at UVic, works at the Electronic Textual Cultures Lab, where his research sits at the intersection of generative AI, knowledge production, and creative practice. As AI reshapes how we write and communicate, Faraz is asking the questions most of us haven't worked up the nerve to sit with yet: what remains irreducibly human?

That question takes a different shape for Dr. Trefor Bazett, an Associate Teaching Professor in UVic's Department of Mathematics and Statistics and a YouTuber with more than 600,000 subscribers. He's won nine teaching awards, holds a PhD in Algebraic Topology from the University of Toronto, and has taught at Oxford and the University of Cincinnati along the way. His YouTube channel has helped millions learn math online. Trefor is proving that mathematical curiosity isn't niche and that the tools math gives us might be exactly what we need to navigate AI, climate change, and an uncertain world.

Navigating crisis, policy, and the public good

Many of this year’s speakers have spent their careers in the hardest rooms where decisions carry real weight and the ground keeps shifting.

Lisa Lapointe served as BC's Chief Coroner for 13 years, overseeing the province's response to the toxic drug public health emergency, the COVID-19 declaration, and the 2021 heat dome that claimed more than 600 lives. A UBC Law School graduate and recipient of the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, she now serves on the board of PHS Community Services Society and with Moms Stop the Harm. Lisa navigated some of the most difficult crises in BC's history by staying anchored in evidence, humility, and a willingness to adapt.

Dr. Tamara Krawchenko brings a global lens to local challenges. As an internationally recognized policy scholar and Associate Director of the Institute for Integrated Energy Systems at UVic, she has more than 20 years of comparative public policy research across more than 12 countries, plus a former senior analyst role at the OECD in Paris. She chairs UVic's Local Governance Hub, sits on the board of Ecotrust Canada, and leads research on rural, remote, and Indigenous communities navigating energy transitions. Her central insight: the quality of governance shapes the texture of everyday life.

Dana Tizya-Tramm is a Vuntut Gwitchin leader, strategist, father, and former Chief of Vuntut Gwitchin First Nation from Old Crow, Yukon. As Chief, Dana helped lead one of Canada’s earliest Indigenous climate emergency declarations and supported the Sree Vyàa Old Crow Solar Project, a landmark northern renewable energy project that helped reduce diesel dependence in Canada’s only fly-in Yukon community. Today, through Nadlii, Dana is working to help Indigenous Nations own, govern, and benefit from their data, AI systems, and digital infrastructure. His work bridges old responsibilities and new technologies. 

And Daniel So, a partner at Dale & Lessmann LLP and a leading franchise lawyer, helps franchisors expand across Canada and internationally, advising on brand protection, partnerships, and the legal frameworks that shape business growth. He has advised provincial governments on franchise legislation, negotiated endorsement and services contracts with Major League Baseball® players and other professional athletes, and arenas. 

Working at the frontier of science

Other speakers are pushing into territory where the stakes are high, and the answers aren't in yet.

Jade Fischer, a PhD candidate in Medical Physics at UVic, is developing FLASH and Minibeam radiation therapy using Very High Energy Electrons (VHEE) techniques that could meaningfully reduce the side effects of cancer treatment. Her work has taken her to CERN's CLEAR facility in Geneva, and she's committed to bringing these conversations further into public conversation.

Jon Willis, a Professor of Astronomy at UVic, trades the cellular scale for the cosmic one. His research spans cosmology and astrobiology, the scientific search for life beyond Earth. As the author of All These Worlds Are Yours and The Pale Blue Data Point, he's joined the exploration vessel Nautilus to study analogues of alien oceans beneath our own seas. Jon tackles the universe's biggest questions, like where did we come from? And are we alone?

And Naomi Casiro, a physiotherapist, educator, and founder of NeuroFit BC and NeuroFit Academy, is rethinking how we age. She founded the only Parkinson's-specific physiotherapy clinic in BC, and her academy now trains healthcare professionals worldwide. Her question is disarmingly simple: what happens when you stop avoiding falls and start training for them? Naomi has spent the past decade finding out.

Protecting the planet and coast we call home

For this speaker, the uncharted territory is environmental, and her work is about making the stakes feel real.

Lilly Woodbury, Regional Manager at Surfrider Foundation Canada, leads ocean and coastal protection campaigns from Tofino. She attended the UN Global Plastic Treaty negotiations as an official observer and helped achieve a historic ban on single-use plastic water bottles in Tofino. With a Master's in Political Ecology from UVic and writing featured in Teen Vogue, Explore Magazine, and Mountain Life, Lilly understands something essential: policy change follows emotional resonance.

Reimagining creativity and community

We’ll be hearing from speakers rewriting what's possible in art, reinvention, and the spaces where creativity grows.

Jenny Farkas, an artist, writer, and creative economic developer, is the Founder and Executive Director of MakeSpace North Park, a nonprofit creating shared access to tools, skills, mentorship, and workspace in Victoria. After more than a decade working with artists, Indigenous communities, and economic development organizations across Vancouver Island, she's landed on a central argument: creative talent isn't scarce; it's everywhere, waiting to be seen. 

Keegan Connor Tracy, an award-winning actor, director, writer, and children's book author, knows reinvention firsthand. Known for her role as the Blue Fairy in “Once Upon a Time” and as a voice artist on the Calm app, she recently directed The Worst Day Ever?, which won Best Director at the Toronto International Women Film Festival. She's pursuing a Master's in Writing and New Media and has an upcoming role in Disney's “Coven Academy”. Keegan is publicly rewriting the script on what creative reinvention looks like mid-career with her daughters watching.

One stage, twelve paths

Every one of these speakers has ventured into uncharted territory—and come back with ideas worth sharing. None of them arrived with a guidebook. They built one as they navigated their research, art, and risk. On October 7th at the UVic Farquhar Auditorium, you'll get to hear how.

Seats are limited, and these are conversations you'll want to be in the room for. Get your tickets and join us on October 7th.