Theme: Voices of The Future

The Perse School is an independent school in Cambridge, UK, with a thriving Sixth Form college. One of our values is intellectual curiosity and scholarship which is best expressed through the successes of our research programme and our public lecture series, which regularly attracts distinguished academics from the Cambridge area. The Sixth Form college offers unique research opportunities for all students who can elect to do a year of specialised investigations into a field of academic worth in the sciences, arts and humanities; students develop an expertise in their field of study by the end of a year of intense research culminating with a written report. We have partnered with a select few student researchers with impressive research portfolios and public engagement records to present the latest “ideas worth spreading” from their respective fields at our event. The students have written their own biographies to introduce themselves which you can read below.

To inspire our student body, we have worked with local academics at the University of Cambridge to lead our event and have compiled a programme of fascinating speakers as detailed below. We are excited to bring experts from climate science to philosophy to our stage. Read more about guest speakers below. The theme of our event is “Voices of The Future” which attests the messages our inspiring student speakers who take to the stage to present interesting topical issues from their fields which reflect positively shaping the future of our world. We have selected our guest speakers to be excellent advocates for progression in their fields and how they want to positively shape the future for our young audience.

We look forward to seeing you at our event.

The Peterhall Performing Arts Centre
The Perse School Cambridge
CB2 8QF
Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, CB2 8QF
United Kingdom

Clare Chambers

Professor

Clare Chambers is Professor of Political Philosophy and a Fellow of Jesus College, University of Cambridge. Her books include Intact: A Defence of the Unmodified Body (Allen Lane / Penguin, 2022) and Against Marriage: An Egalitarian Defence of the Marriage-Free State (Oxford University Press, 2017). Clare regularly appears on radio, including BBC Radio 4 (PM, Broadcasting House, Woman’s Hour, Sweet Reason, How To Disagree); BBC Radio 3 (Free Thinking) and the BBC World Service (Deeply Human).

Hannah Pang

Middle School Student

Hannah is currently a student at The Perse Upper school. She is fan of all things related to psychology and popular science and will happily explore any topics that pique her interest from psychopaths to cognitive biases. She loves to share with others the topics she's passionate about and fascinated by. Her TEDx talk is originally based off of spending three hours in a bookshop after finding "The Psychopath Test" by Jon Ronson, at age 9.

Henry Field

Middle School Student

Awaiting biography...

Ioanna Mackenna

Sixth Form Student/ Researcher

Ioanna is a passionate advocate for modernising politics. Her research in politics is outlined in her latest analysis on the influence of social media platforms on policy creation. Ioanna is also particularly interested in the political situation within South America and has recently completed a research paper evaluating the importance of economic crisis in explaining the wave of democratisation in the region in the 1980s. She continues her work on reforming public perception of politics through the media with her public engagements. She is a leading young voice on modernising the political world.

Jonathan Shanahan

Postdoctoral Research Associate

Jonathan Shanahan is a postdoctoral medical research associate at Cambridge University affiliated with the Ramakrishnan Research Group. He has dedicated his work to the mycobacterium ESX-1 and advanced therapies for tuberculosis (TB) by leading his field's understanding of ESX-1-mediated virulence in early phases of infection. Jonathan continues to work on TB with interests in macrophage phagosomal damage, granuloma formation, and virulence.

Neelkantha Mukherjee

Sixth Form Student/ Researcher

Neelkantha is an avid academic. His passion for the sciences, encompasses both basic and applied aspects. Neelkantha is a staunch believer in using multidisciplinary approaches to find solutions to problems affecting people’s health and the world we live in. He spends much of his research time exploring, investigating and formulating new ideas that he can share with others to bring about positive change. In his first TEDx talk he promulgates the promise of brain-machine interface technology in reducing human disease and suffering.

Riddhi Bhimpuria

Middle School Student

Riddhi is a Year 11 student at the Perse School. After a discussion with her father about her family history, in which she learned about her great-aunt who had previously passed away due to breast cancer, she felt obliged to learn more about the subject to learn more about her family. However, as she learned more about oncology and the fascinating new treatments developed within it, she was encouraged to study more about precision medicine, an example of such an approach. This is the premise of her first TEDx talk, in which she aims to uncover some of the racial disparities that might not necessarily be addressed within precision medicine, as well as how they may be overcome to guarantee that the new model that healthcare is moving towards truly benefits us all.

Sorcha Brickel

Sixth Form Student/ Researcher

Sorcha is a Year 13 student who hopes to study history at university. To explore this interest she has researched piracy in the Caribbean and has recently been expanding this to look into piracy in the Mediterranean and the South China Sea. As well as this, she also has interests ranging from Druidic societies to the Crusades.