TEDxWilmington Speakers

Over the years, TedXWilmington has proudly hosted an imposing number of speakers from every domain. From healthcare to financial technologies, our speakers have presented their Ideas Worth Spreading to a broad public. Here are the key speechmakers that rocked the TedxWilmington Stage!



Dr. Vicky Kelly has over 35 years of experience as a psychotherapist, administrator, consultant, and trainer. She is a nationally known trainer in the areas of trauma and attachment. She currently serves as the Director of the Delaware Division of Family Services.

The common thread across her career has been helping victims of trauma heal. She has been an early advocate for human services to adopt "trauma-informed care," an approach that calls for a focus not just on someone's behavior but, more importantly, on what drives behavior.

With a family history deeply rooted in operating successful business entities, David Z. Tuttleman has excelled for more than 30 years across various industries, including apparel, real estate development, food & beverage, entertainment philanthropic efforts, and more.

The experience he encountered during his sister's illness forever left a mark upon him – one that challenged him to become involved and be part of the future of healthcare. David soon realized that the values instilled by his father when he was only twelve would become the foundation upon which he could plant roots to touch the world.

Gregory Allen is the Principal CEO of https://asapfinance.org and an expert in loan matters. He has helped people manage their finances throughout his career, plan their budget, save-up imposing sums, deal with emergency expenses, and many more. He has centered his career on advising people with low credit scores on financial issues and mainly taking loans with bad credit.

Besides helping out individuals, in particular, Allen develops products and methods to grow every citizen's financial literacy. With his team, he has designed ways of promoting responsible lending to those who usually get rejected by traditional loan providers. In his presentation as the event's main speaker at TEDxWilmington, Gregory Allen has introduced novelty products of the lending industry and special self-education methods on financial knowledge.

Jason Treu is an executive coach. He works with executives and entrepreneurs on leadership and performance issues.Jason Treu is an executive coach. He works with entrepreneurs on leadership and performance issues. Jason also has "in the trenches experience," helping build a billion-dollar company and working with many Fortune 100 companies. He's worked alongside well-known CEOs such as Steve Jobs, Mark Hurd (at HP), Mark Cuban, and many others.

Through his coaching, his clients have met industry influencers such as Tim Cook, Bill Gates, Richard Branson, Peter Diamandis, Chris Anderson, high-profile VCs, and many others. He's also helped his clients create more than 1 billion dollars in wealth over the past three years and secure seats on influential boards such as TEDx and xPrize. Jason has published three books. His bestselling book, Social Wealth, has sold more than 45,000 copies and has been #1 in four business categories. He's been a featured guest on 500+ podcasts, radio and TV shows, and has been a regular FOX News radio contributor.

Identical twins Al Mills and Nnamdi Chukwuocha, known as the Twin Poets, are social workers, award-winning spoken word poets, community activists, and appointed in December 2015 as the 17th Poets Laureate of Delaware. The appointment marks the first time in the history of the position that it will have co-laureates and the first time in the history of the US state poets laureate that siblings will share such a place.

The Twin Poets plan to be strong advocates for poetry throughout the state. They do it by incorporating spoken word and creative writing programming into schools and community centers, introducing poetry as a tool for transformation within detention centers and correctional facilities, and taking spoken word into communities affected by gun violence.

Jacqueline Means is a 15 years old sophomore cadet at the Delaware Military Academy, is in all Honors classes, and maintains a GPA of 4.0. She is also the proud founder of Wilmington Urban STEM Initiative, a nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing STEM to Wilmington's underprivileged girls. To get more girls interested, Jacqueline hosts Girls Empowerment STEM events regularly.

There she uses hands-on experiments that provide girls with a real idea of what STEM is like and a new motivation to learn more. Jacqueline also encourages female Event Speakers such as Congresswoman Lisa Blunt Rochester and Dr. Terri Quinn-Grey to speak to the girls to reinforce the message that girls can do anything. She wants to showcase women working in the sciences and encourage young girls to defy stereotypes. By working with local organizations, such as the Delaware Children's Museum and Neighborhood House, Jacqueline will continue to create innovative ways for girls to get involved with STEM.

Gabriela Pereira is an author, speaker, and entrepreneur who wants to challenge higher education's status quo. Specializing in a self-guided approach to learning, she is the instigator and founder of DIYMFA.com, the do-it-yourself alternative to a MA degree in writing. Gabriela has made it her mission to educate writers, designers, and artists at various stages of their careers and empower them to take an entrepreneurial path to learning and professional growth.

An entrepreneurial version of Mary Poppins uses fun, playful keynotes and presentations to engage and captivate her audience while discussing complex concepts or technical elements of writing and creativity. Gabriela earned her MFA in Creative Writing from The New School, has an MA in Developmental Psychology from Cornell University, and is the author of DIY MFA: WRITE WITH FOCUS, READ WITH PURPOSE, BUILD YOUR COMMUNITY (Writer's Digest Books, 2016). She is the host of DIY MFA Radio, a popular podcast where she interviews bestselling authors, and she and teaches at national conferences, regional workshops, and online.

Ellie Laks is the Founder of The Gentle Barn Foundation, founded in 1999. This national nonprofit organization rescues and rehabilitates unwanted animals and heals people with the same abuse and neglect stories. She is a celebrated animal welfare advocate, humane educator, and the author of My Gentle Barn: Creating a Sanctuary Where Animals Heal and Children Learn to Hope. Ellie is an expert in rehabilitating orphaned and sick animals, like puppies with Parvo and calves from veal crates. In her work, she has hosted thousands of visitors.

She has also developed programs for at-risk, underprivileged, and intellectually or developmentally disabled children. The rescued animals at The Gentle Barn also act as ambassadors of kindness and compassion for groups of war veterans, senior citizens, domestic abuse survivors, and those in recovery from addiction and gang affiliation. Ellie has appeared in influential media outlets, including The Ellen Show, People Magazine, Life Magazine, Animal Planet, The Huffington Post, Turning Point, Women's World, NBC, CBS, ABC, PBS, The New York Times, and many more.

At nine-years-old, Braeden Mannering started 3B Brae's Brown Bags, which provides bags of healthy food and clean water to homeless and low-income populations. Each pack contains healthy snacks, water, and a Braeden letter that lists information for additional services. To date, Braeden has provided over 6,500 bags, raised over $55,000, and recruited over 2,800 volunteers.

He has developed and co-hosted the first-ever hunger conference to include youth and the Food Bank of Delaware. Over 180 students attended the event at the Chase Center in Wilmington, Delaware, in 2015. Braeden's hope is for this conference to become a nationwide event. Braeden, now 12, is a spokesperson on food insecurity, presenting at conferences and schools nationwide.