Lilly Bianchi

Lilly is currently a Senior at LFHS, and in 2014 she spent six weeks riding her bike from Charleston, SC to Los Angeles, CA with Overland Summers. When not biking, you can find her at the rink with the girls hockey team or spending time with her family. While when Lilly was five she wanted to be an astronaut, and now she is considering studying either English or Environmental Studies in college.

​Tommy Block

Tommy has been a movie fanatic from day one. Every day he looks to consolidate his experiences and ideas through the concepts, techniques, and structures of cinema. He maintains Block Review, his Facebook page in which he critiques movies, old and new, and shares what makes them important for readers as movie lovers and as people.

​Karen Connell

Karen is a multi-media artist who creates simulated imagery. Her art has appeared in movies, television, shelter magazines and the NY Times.  She is also the Creative Director of Carmel Creative where she creates motion graphics and custom props for clients.

​John Fahrenbach

John is a senior honors student at Lake Forest High School.  He has spent many hours of his time working with developmentally disabled residents at Misericordia Home in Chicago.  Last fall, he organized "Miles for Misericordia," a one day, 100-mile bike ride that raised over $25,000 for the charity.  John is a three-time recipient of the President's Volunteer Service Award for his commitment to Misericordia and several other community organizations.


​Henry Feingold

Henry is freshman at Lake Forest High School. As a first-year student, he plays football, lacrosse and squash. In addition to athletics, he has wide and varied interests, including cooking, fishing, snorkeling and nature.  Academically, he is interested in math and science, and with that foundation in place, he hopes to have a career in technology - specifically, cyber security, penetration testing or game development. He chooses to participate at TEDxLFHS because he would love the chance to express his ideas on a creative platform with innovative thinkers. 

Brian Floriani

Motivated to serve following his father’s untimely death, Brian left a career in golf and took a position as a reading paraprofessional at an elementary in Zion, Ill. To his dismay, he discovered that most at-risk children are not “reading ready” when entering kindergarten. Because of this, these children were behind from the start. Brian determined that lack of book ownership was not an issue of supply – it was simply a matter of logistics, and, in September 2009, Brian founded Bernie’s Book Bank. Today, Bernie’s Book Bank operates out of a 35,000 sq. ft. facility in Lake Bluff, Ill., and has collected, processed and distributed more than 4.5 million quality books to at-risk children in the Chicagoland area.

​Kimie Han

Kimie is an aspiring pianist and violinist. As a freshman at Lake Forest High School, she has performed piano concertos with the Chicago Symphony Orchesta, Lake Forest Symphony, Midwest Young Artists Symphony Orchestra, and also at other venues all around the world. Kimie has recently been selected as a 2016-2018 Lang Lang Young Scholar by the Lang Lang International Music Foundation. These opportunities allow her to share her passion of music with others, especially to generations of people, ranging from toddlers to seniors. Her goal is to spread the importance of music, and how it can affect society today.

​Maria Hernandez

Maria is an aspiring earth scientist who loves learning and sharing her knowledge. She has an amazing ability to excite students of all ages about STEM-related ideas and apply them to the world around us. She’s been working to empower students for over seven years through Brown University’s Summer Programs in Providence, RI and Costa Rica and the Schuler Scholar Program in the Chicago area. She enjoys volunteering for organizations as a part of her mission to serve and educate. Maria believes that her journey to make her dreams a reality will motivate others to realize their own dreams.   

Mady Kung

Mady is a sophomore at Lake Forest High School. She enjoys school a lot, but in her free time, she also loves creative writing, public speaking, running, and meditating. Mady has always been fascinated with how language - which is something that we constantly hear and absorb as soon as we come into this world - allows us to both share and understand complex ideas. Because of this, the language(s) that we speak will inherently shape the way that we perceive things because it is the way in which we make sense of the world around us. In her Ted Talk, she will expand upon why saving endangered languages, much like saving endangered species, is so critically important to the world.

​Bailey Lawrence

Bailey is a junior at Lake Forest High School who’s passion is theatre and film. She has been an honor roll student, but grew up with a reading and auditory processing disability. Bailey would always excel in a project based learning environment rather than lecture based classes. She never really fit into the traditional lecture and test based education system. She didn’t realize until her freshman year in New Media, that being a visual learner gave her a creative and artistic advantage. She could finally leave her school frustrations behind and communicate through telling visual stories.

​Thomas McAfee

Thomas is president of Northwestern Medicine Lake Forest Hospital and senior vice president of Northwestern Memorial HealthCare. He has led nationally recognized health organizations through enormous change and is currently building the new Lake Forest Hospital to provide breakthrough, world-class medicine. Leveraging advancements in technology, patient care models, academic research and building design, he is developing a contemporary model to enhance the health of our communities.

​Jim McGowan

Jim is the Director of Planning and Situational Awareness for the American Red Cross, North Central Division. Headquartered in Chicago, he has assembled a team of more than 50 volunteers and staff who manage data to tell the up-to-the-minute story of Red Cross activities and programs. During times of disaster, he deploys as a member of the Division's Response Management Team. He has championed the use of open-source and free applications throughout the organization and is an avid supporter of Chicago’s burgeoning 'civic tech' community.

Mary Beth Nawor

Mary Beth has been teaching Environmental Science at LFHS for over 20 years, sharing her love of the natural sciences and nature.  Her passion is teaching and sharing what she’s learned with her family and students. When not teaching you can find her working in her garden and volunteering with conservation organizations.  She aspires to increase awareness of the physical and mental benefits of integrating nature into our daily lives.

​Kelsey Schmidt

Kelsey is a senior at LFHS. She has been running for the past eight years. Over the past two years she has had the opportunity to see a dynamic movement specialist and learn about the science behind movement. Learning more about the science behind the sport has allowed her to find a lifelong passion and inspired her to major in Exercise Science next year at Indiana University. She hopes to use science to help others increase performance and decrease injuries. 

Johnny Silver

Johnny is a 7th grade student at Lake Forest Country Day School. John spends his free time invested in computers and the outdoors. Johnny is heavily invested in understanding how things work and preserving them. This has led him to giving his TEDxLFHS talk. Johnny will be giving a TEDxLFHS talk about climate, hitting upon things most people aren’t aware of - such as, overpopulation of giant jellyfish.