Theme: Renaissance and Renewal

In a post-pandemic and social movement-driven world, we have entered a period of rebirth. Centuries of racial discrimination, environmental neglect, and gender inequities are being challenged. The desire to connect with families, neighbors, and strangers has been heightened by periods of isolation and uncertainty. As we begin to lose our masks, our voices are more important than ever. Our speakers and theme will be highlighting our world’s renewed interest in learning, discoveries, and the beginning of our new modern world.

Rachel Tao
3700 O St NW
Washington, District of Columbia, 20057
United States

Anna Marie Tendler

Artist

Anna is a multidisciplinary artist working in photography, textiles, drawing, painting and interior design. she holds an M.A. in fashion and textile history from NYU’s Costume Studies program. her master’s thesis, titled The Lip Filler Phenomenon: Modern Medicine, Kylie Jenner, and Postfeminist Female Sexuality, explored the recent history of lip filler and the sociocultural politics of female aesthetics as analyzed through medical texts and popular cultural discourses. she likes to think of her life as an ever-evolving art piece.

Chi Ossé

NY City Councilor

Chi Ossé is an activist, third-generation Brooklynite, and prominent figure in the Black Lives Matter movement. His lived experience growing up in Brooklyn was the tense dichotomy between a nourishing upbringing in a loving community, and the daily crush of individual and systemic bigotry.

Christopher Bradshaw

Social Activist

Christopher Bradshaw is an African American social justice entrepreneur whose expertise is using social innovation through the food system to grow meaningful community economic development within marginalized communities. Bradshaw has been named a 2015 Ashoka-American Express Emerging Innovator, one of Food Trust’s 20 Leaders Under 40, and the longest-serving member of the DC Food Policy Council where he co-chairs the Urban Agriculture working group. Under his leadership, Dreaming Out Loud has grown to a $600,000 social enterprise with 6 full-time staff members, and 4 seasonal farm and food hub assistants. He is a frequent speaker on the intersections of racial justice, class, gender, and food sovereignty — his appearances include the Atlantic Ideas Festival, Bloomberg American Health Summit; and both regional and national gatherings for farmers and food activists.

Christopher Wade

Christopher Wade is a sophomore in the College with majors in Government & Computer Science and a minor in Spanish. He loves getting people excited about their passions, and as someone who became obsessed with niche hobby culture over quarantine, finds that there is great use in "Pondering Pandemic Pastimes" to explore the implications that a newfound love for personal interests may have for our futures.

Kearney Capuano

Kearney Capuano is a sophomore in the NHS studying Global Health, Psychology, and Philosophy. She is the founder and president of Georgetown's chapter of Effective Altruism, a philosophical and intellectual movement asking the question "How can we do the most good with the resources we have?" She runs an Effective Altruism Fellowship for students introducing cost-effective and intellectual solutions to solving some of the world's most pressing problems in cause areas such as global health, animal welfare, climate change, and bio risks. Kearney spent the past year researching in Georgetown's Laboratory on Social and Affective Neuroscience and spent the summer researching for Yale's Clinical and Affective Neuroscience Lab. She is also the student lead on a Charity Elections Project, a school-wide event in which high schoolers vote among three high-impact charity organizations to donate to. In her free time, Kearney is the captain of Georgetown's Irish Dance Team.

Keely O'Keefe

Keely is a Junior in the SFS majoring in Global Business. She is a transfer student from Brown University, where she was recruited to play D1 field hockey. She is passionate about Diversity, Equity and Inclusion as well as tech, entrepreneurship and consulting. While at Brown she was nominated as Brown University's representative at the 2019 NCAA Diversity Equity and Inclusion Conference in Atlanta. She has also interned at an ed-tech start-up which was later acquired. She co-founded her own start-up, Clade. Her team secured venture funding in Fall 2020 and was accepted to Harvard Innovation Labs Spring Accelerator. After taking their product to market, she returned to Georgetown to finish her undergraduate degree. In her time at Georgetown she has continued her passion for solving business problems by exploring consulting. She currently works at Hilltop Consultants and is an incoming Associate Consultant Intern at Bain and Company.

Nick Cruz Velleman

Nick Cruz Velleman is an American artist of Peruvian/Filipino descent born and raised in Washington, D.C. While living there he taught in the studio art department at Georgetown Day School, worked as a manager and director for the 9:30 Club, and performed locally and regionally as a musician with various groups. He has also spent much of his life in Aix-en-Provence, France, where he studied painting and drawing on-and-off since 2009, and earned his M.F.A. degree from the Marchutz School of Fine Arts in 2020. Nick aspires to a career of teaching art, creativity, and the mental health benefits that come with it… while traveling the world and painting, of course.

Olivia Henry

Olivia Henry is a sophomore in the College studying Women and Gender Studies along with Government. She is part of the inaugural Black Interfaith Fellowship at Georgetown’s Campus Ministry, where she is working to increase representation and resources in non-Christian spiritual practices for her fellow Black-identifying peers. With an emphasis on marginalized communities, particularly in her queer and Black identities, she is interested in finding ways to go about healing racial trauma. In addition to her passion of leveraging collective organizing to heal, through her minor in Education, Inquiry, and Justice, she is exploring the ways in which education can evolve to allow for generational uplift. In combination with her experience tutoring with D.C. Schools and volunteering at her local Boys and Girls Club, she has a soft spot for teaching and youth development.

Omar Alshogre

Human Rights Activist

Omar Alshogre is a Syrian refugee, a public speaker and human rights activist who is currently the Director for Detainee Affairs at the Syrian Emergency Task Force.

Taylor Cassidy

Spearheading social media, Taylor Cassidy is a social media content creator teaching her audience of millions of unsung Black history figures accompanied by her quick wit and strong passion. Seen in her series “Fast Black History” and “Black Girl Magic Minute” she uses her platform to advocate for inclusion, representation, and love for one’s culture. She’s earned a Streamy Creator Honor from Liza Koshy and is a creator host for Sirius XM's new TikTok Radio Channel. She’s also been featured in TikTok’s 2020 Top 100 list under Voices of Change: Most impactful creators and Teen Vogue’s 2021 21 under 21 list. Generous with sharing motivation and finding her creative voice, she is passionate about encouraging others to dream bigger for themselves.

Trip Gorman

Trip Gorman is a Sophomore at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service studying Global Business. Trip is a Microeconomics Teaching Assistant interested in both venture capital and management consulting. He is currently interning as a China Research Intern for the U.S. Department of State and interned over the winter as a Venture Capital Investment Analyst Intern for a Shanghai based VC fund, SOSV. Last summer Trip interned in-person for both SOMOS Internet, a Y-Combinator backed telecommunications start-up in Medellín, Colombia as well as California Senator Dianne Feinstein in her Capitol Hill office.