John Kao, author of “Innovation Nation,” and Gary White, co-founder and chief executive officer of Water.org, will discuss “Changing the World through Innovation” in a free public talk March 4 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
John Kao, author of “Innovation Nation,” and Gary White, co-founder and chief executive officer of Water.org, will discuss “Changing the World through Innovation” in a free public talk March 4 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Chancellor Holden Thorp, co-author of “Engines of Innovation,” will moderate the discussion at 5:30 p.m. in G-100, the auditorium on the lower/ground floor of the Genome Sciences Building, 250 Bell Tower Road. No tickets or reservations are required. Free parking is available after 5 p.m. in the Bell Tower parking deck.
Kao and White, a UNC alumnus, come to Carolina as the 2013 Frey Foundation Distinguished Visiting Professors in the College of Arts and Sciences.
Dubbed “Mr. Creativity,” Kao is chairman of the World Economic Forum’s Global Advisory Council on Innovation and founder and chairman of the Institute for Large Scale Innovation, a group of innovation leaders from around the world.
White and actor Matt Damon co-founded Water.org, a nonprofit dedicated to empowering people in the developing world to gain access to safe water and sanitation. To date, Water.org has served about one million people. In 2011, TIME magazine included him on its list of the world’s 100 most influential people. A graduate of UNC’s Gillings School of Global Public Health, White received a Distinguished Alumnus Award from UNC in 2002.
The Frey talk complements UNC’s Water in our World initiative, a two-year interdisciplinary academic theme that is exploring diverse aspects of the importance of water to human and natural life and the ongoing challenges associated with water scarcity and pollution.
The Frey Foundation Distinguished Visiting Professorship was established in 1989 to bring to campus distinguished leaders from government, public affairs and the arts. UNC alumnus David Gardner Frey chairs the foundation established by his parents.
College of Arts and Sciences contact: Dee Reid, (919) 843-6339, deereid@unc.edu