The 8th annual TEDxAUA returned to AUA on May 26, bringing together students, faculty, and community members for a day of ideas, stories and meaningful conversations.
Organized by a student-led team, this year’s TEDxAUA centered on the theme “In Transit.” Speakers from diverse backgrounds took the stage to share personal stories and experiences of change, growth, and transition.
The event was held in Manoogian Hall, with attendees first gathering in the Paramaz Avedissian Building. There, organizers introduced this year’s theme and shared information about the activities planned for the day before guests proceeded to the main event.
Before the start of the event, the team welcomed guests with creative boards highlighting different life transitions. Attendees were also invited to write motivational messages on paper airplanes, which they later shared with others at the end of the event. Once the audience gathered in Manoogian Hall, the TEDxAUA stage was ready for a day of inspiring talks and meaningful stories.
TEDxAUA was established in 2018 to create a space that will allow everyone to share their thoughts and exchange their great ideas in AUA. It is the biggest student-led, independently organized event in the university.
This year’s theme achieved that with the shared experiences of students and professors of various transitions, such as moving in and out of countries, finding true passion, facing uncertainty, transitioning from a mindset of loss, overcoming health issues and much more. All of these talks with unique perspectives connected the audience, provoking thoughts of decisions each makes in transit. The speakers were Aram Serobyan, Kyle Khandikian, Astghik Atanyan, Meline Afrikyan and Dr. Michael Kouchakdjian.
Dr. Kouchakdjian, shared his life experience, his transition to AUA, and gave valuable advice to the audience. His talk was held in the format of an interview, which created a conversational and truly open atmosphere.
Between talks, the energy of the evening kept being magical with musical and dance performances by the Armenian rock band Sevagir and talented contemporary dancers Sona Ghazaryan and Erik Davtyan that complemented the discussion and the theme of the evening.
Among the speakers, Meline Afrikyan, a CS senior, touched on the topic of overcoming uncertainty and fear of the unknown with her own life example of transitioning from fearing math to becoming truly passionate about it. While describing her path towards becoming a speaker, she highlighted that she wanted to participate since coming to AUA, believing that this event would give her the opportunity to share her ideas and truly be heard by her peers. As she recalled her preparations for the event, Afrikyan described it as a bundle of excitement, stress, fun, valuable experience and an unimaginable amount of effort both from her side and from the side of the team.
Reflecting on preparations, Afrikyan recalled one special and memorable moment when she and the team were laughing for 30 minutes because of a silly mistake during the rehearsals. “I even remembered it before going onto the stage, and I was hoping I wouldn’t burst out laughing just like I did that time,” she said.
She referred to her experience on the stage by stating that “everything about that day, the event, was just an event of a lifetime,” and as a recent graduate , she said, “whenever I remember AUA, I think one of the best memories will be TEDxAUA.”
One of the most important components created was the event’s theme. Maria Petrosyan, a DS junior student, was one of the executive team members. Petrosyan described that the team came up with the idea of the theme when they realized that each of them was undergoing various transitions in different ways in their own lives, so they decided to go with “In Transit.”
“We usually take transition as something temporary or uncertain, but the main goal here was to take it as a meaningful part of life itself,” she said.
When it came to reflecting on the overall organizational process, Petrosyan described the biggest challenge being the coordination of multiple teams that were responsible for different aspects. While describing teamwork, she emphasized the importance of adaptability. She explained that everyone needed to “always be available and ready for the changes that we can face” and added that success came from the realization that “we are a team and we can solve and come out of these situations if we are flexible, if we really aim to reach our goal, and we have this vision in front of us.”
Attendees also reflected on the profound impact and important insights that they gained after this year’s TEDxAUA. First-time attendee, PG freshman student Vazgen Manukyan, reflected on his experience by stating that it was a particularly enjoyable and valuable experience for him and how each of the talks connected with him, giving a new perspective that he viewed as a theme of “opportunities and personal growth.” Seeing the effort of the team, he recognized how important this event was for the students to connect, create a community and learn from each other. The whole experience and event felt so important for him that he eventually left with the feeling of wanting to join this community. “Maybe in the future I would like to be part of this event as a volunteer,” he said.
Eventually, starting from inspiring talks and emotional performances and finishing with the enormous amount of work behind the scenes, the 8th annual TEDxAUA encouraged the AUA community to reflect on their lives and recognize their own “In Transit” periods from new perspectives and reached their goal of showing how transitions are lifelong, meaningful journeys rather than temporary phases in life.
