TEDxMountainViewHighSchool

Speakers

Speakers may not be confirmed. Check the event website for the latest lineup.

• Addie Hanna

  Student

  Addie Hanna is a junior at Mountain View High School. She proudly serves as the vice president of Animal Welfare Club and president of Key Club. She takes pride in being on the varsity sideline cheer team, competitive cheer team, and gymnastics team. In her talk, she brings light to the common yet taboo struggle of overthinking and aims to show the audience how to channel anxiety and worries into tranquil thoughts and goals.

• Anoushka Dugar

  Student

  Anoushka Dugar is a junior at Mountain View High School. As the Print Opinions Editor of the Oracle, a passionate design student at Freestyle Academy, and a dedicated MVHS peer counselor, she is drawn to creative and collaborative spaces. Having noticed many of her teenage peers struggle with self esteem and through her own journey of wrestling with it, she realizes the importance of understanding how we can cultivate it. In her talk, through poetry and prose, she explores how we can escape the cycle of depending on external validation and empower ourselves to value who we are.

• Arthur Muller

  Student

  Driven by a desire to understand how personal struggles shape growth, Arthur focuses on themes of role models, resilience and hope. As one of the captains of the distance track and cross country teams, Arthur appreciates the opportunity to talk about resilience without thinking of a 5k race. Join Arthur on his talk as he explores his personal struggles through the lens of the hope that role models in his life provide. Arthur is a junior at Mountain View High School.

• Connor Kao

  Student

  Connor Kao is a senior at Mountain View High School and serves as the Secretary/PR on the Senior Class Cabinet of ASB. As a lifelong athlete and avid sports fan, he’s seen firsthand how superstitions—those quirky rituals and unwavering beliefs—can boost confidence and performance. In his talk, he’ll explore how belief, routines, and placebos aren’t just psychological; they are self-fulfilling forces that can physically rewire the body and reality itself.

• Ethan Louie

  Student

  Ethan Louie is a senior at Mountain View High School and a proud member of the MVLA Speech and Debate team. Growing up Chinese in an English-speaking household, Ethan understands what it feels like to live between two cultures. His story flips the typical immigrant narrative—rather than finding a place in America, he’s learning to find his place in his own lost culture. Join him on his talk, “The Language of Belonging,” to explore how identity can go beyond the words we speak and how reconnecting with culture can take on many forms.

• Isabela Margain

  Student

  Isabela Margain is a senior at Mountain View High School and an active member of the MVLA speech and debate team. As someone whose answer to “what are you?” usually requires a bit of explaining, her identity and lived experiences has been far from “black-or-white”. It has taught her to see nuance and to build connections that aren’t readily apparent. In her talk, she explores our society's binary view of race, amidst the role of multiraciality throughout American history.

• Joaquin Garcia Bueno

  Student

  Joaquin Garcia Bueno is a senior at Mountain View High School who moved from Ecuador to the United States in 2021. Once a kid hiding under his hood, he transformed his life by choosing to trust the process rather than overthinking the past. His talk explores how letting go of "what if" and believing that everything happens for a reason can transform our greatest challenges into our most defining moments.

• Kapil Kamran

  Student

  Kapil Kamran is a junior at Mountain View High School and the Head Drum Major of the Spartan Marching Band. He’s deeply involved in Speech and Debate and Mock Trial, and people know him as someone who never runs out of things to say while encouraging others to speak up too. Through years of navigating spaces where not every voice is treated equally, Kapil has seen how easily ideas can be dismissed and how deeply that silence can affect people. In his talk, he shares the impact of being ignored and why making room for every voice is a responsibility we all share.

• Landon Qizilbash

  Student

  In his TEDx talk, Landon Qizilbash, an avid movie and television fan and a senior at Mountain View High School, dives into the unspoken phenomenon of Book Hangover, that strange yet powerful emptiness we feel after finishing a beloved fiction series. He explains his findings on how this feeling is created and how it can be prevented next time you binge a new series.

• Nikolai Hernandez

  Student

  Nikolai Hernandez is a junior at Mountain View High School and is an MVHS Ambassador, wrestler, and military kid. He’s seen how the Bay Area’s obsession with achievement has turned stress into a lifestyle. In his talk, Nikolai will take on the culture of competition, burnout, and silence by offering a new way to think about mental health in one of the most high-pressure places to grow up.

• Shane Andersen

  Urban Planner

  Shane and his wife have three kids and live near Sacramento. He has a degree in Urban Planning and works for PG&E's Land Department. He enjoys spearfishing, gold prospecting, and adventurous travel. In his talk, he will recount harrowing moments from being kidnapped in Mexico and the positive ways it has changed his life.