Theme: "Synergy"

Our theme for this year will centre on the idea of "Synergy" and how the collaborative impact of a collective can, at times, be greater than the sum of its individuals parts.

Our philosophy is that unique “ideas” from Tottenham and beyond should empower the many and not the few.

Ada. National College for Digital Skills
Broad Lane
London, Haringey, N15 4AG
United Kingdom

Ara Harmonic

Musician/Producer

singer, songwriter & producer ​ArA Harmonic from Bristol works closely alongside producer Spider J (Lee Perry, Mad Professor, Madness) together they have been crafting unique sounds and taking it to many stages across the UK. ​ Including opening for ​artists like Lee 'Scratch Perry' and Dub Pistols. Ara Harmonic has headlined Roundhouse Rising Festival and performed at the ​Jazz Cafe, 02 Islington academy, Bestival & Camp Bestival. Ara Harmonic's sound has an ​eclectic influence and see her fuse her personal lyricism with a melodic layering of harmonies, which she delivers in an impassioned live performance.

Ben Anderson

Co-founder of Musicalize

Ben is the co-founder of live event and concert promotions company ‘Musicalize’. Almost 6 years on, Musicalize is now regarded as “one of the UK’s fastest growing live music events” and has staged concerts and events with a range of UK and US. On a day-to-day basis, Ben handles all things relating to the Marketing & PR of Musicalize events and the business in general so is usually seen phone in hand replying to phone calls, emails or the numerous messages across social media that the company receive each day.

Biz Pears

Host

Elizabeth Pears is deputy news editor at BuzzFeed UK. Before this, she was news editor at The Voice, Britain’s leading black newspaper, where she championed and developed young talent and wrote extensively about racial discrimination and deaths in custody, as well as leading the newspaper’s shift in focus on issues that impact the UK’s growing British African population. Previous roles include work on The Guardian’s Reading the Riots project, a data-driven study into the causes and consequences of the 2011 London riots, and senior news reporter at the Haringey Independent where she started her career. She lives in and loves Tottenham

Linda Yueh

Economist

Dr. Linda Yueh is Fellow in Economics at St Edmund Hall, University of Oxford, Adjunct Professor of Economics at London Business School, and Visiting Professor of Economics at Peking University. She is a broadcaster, including for BBC Radio 4 and the World Service, and was the BBC’s Chief Business Correspondent and host of “Talking Business with Linda Yueh”, as well as Economics Editor at Bloomberg TV. She is widely published and is the Editor of the Economic Growth and Development book series at Routledge. Her books include: Macroeconomics (with Graeme Chamberlin), Globalisation and Economic Growth in China (with Yang Yao), The Law and Economics of Globalisation: New Challenges for a World in Flux,

Mark Smith

Founder of Ada College

Mark was a member of the inaugural cohort of Teach First in 2003. He has subsequently worked for Lloyds Banking group in the UK and South Africa, and helped establish a school in Uganda. He graduated from Harvard in 2011 with an interdisciplinary Masters in Education before joining The Future Leaders Trust, an education leadership charity

Noo Saro-Wiwa

Author

Noo Saro-Wiwa is an author of Looking for Transwonderland: Travels in Nigeria ​(Granta, 2012). The book is an irreverent but moving travelogue that chronicles Saro-Wiwa’s trip around the country of her birth, a journey she made following the murder of her father, the human rights activist Ken Saro-Wiwa. Noo was awarded a Miles Morland Scholarship for non-fiction writing in 2015. She also wrote ​for the anthology An Unreliable Guide to London (Influx Press, 2016), and contributed ​to A Place of Refuge (Unbound, 2016), ​an anthology of writing on ​asylum seekers. She has written book reviews, travel, opinion and analysis articles for The Guardian newspaper, The Independent, The Financial Times, The Times Literary Supplement and ​Prospect magazine, among others. ​Earlier this year she launched her new blog, The Slow Release.

Teriy Keys

Producer

In 2010, Teriy founded R.O.A.D* GROUP OF COMPANIES (*Righteous Organised Always Determined), a multi-faceted Entertainment company comprising a Record label, Artist management and Publishing company with an in-house Video production services and then in 2012, further developing the business to incorporate a Educational Training Social Enterprise to sharing the skills he has learned pilot testing the concept by running workshops for children in Haringey’s social care system and partnering up with Tottenham Hotspur Football Foundation to provide courses in the community.

Tobi Oredein

Journalist

Tobi Oredein is a writer and an international public speaker from London. A graduate from Kings College London, she started her career in entertainment journalism working for TV Times, Daily Mail and Look magazine. In that time, she interviewed an eclectic range of famous faces including her journalism idol Trevor McDonald, Dermot O’Leary, former Doctor Who companion Jenna-Louise Coleman, and British diver Tom Daley. In June 2014, alongside her co-founder, she led a small team to launch Black Ballad, a publication that seeks to tell the human experience through the eyes of black British women. Tobi and her team pride themselves on making Black Ballad the leading lifestyle website for black British women by covering issues such as black women and disability, black women and mental health, as well as the relationship blackness has within private education, beauty and fashion. The site has also interviewed high profile British names such as Kidulthood actor Aml Ameen.

Tom Fogden

Dean of Ada College

Tom was also a participant in the first cohort of teachers for Teach First. He then worked at Deloitte Consulting on a variety of projects. He was then seconded to the London Olympics as the project manager for the supply chain. Most recently, he worked at Teach First leading the strategy team, reporting directly to the CEO and Founder.