A middle schooler really wants to trust the adults have her best interests in mind. But some of the most powerful people at her school begin to make that very difficult.

DeSantis has passed law after law about what can and can’t be taught in Florida classrooms, starting as early as elementary school. And last spring, Florida Republicans introduced a bill initially proposing to ban things like critical race theory and identity politics, or students majoring in things like gender studies in Florida universities. Reporter Emmanuel Dzotsi followed how things unfolded at one of the biggest universities there, Florida State, from the bill’s introduction all the way to its passage.

Over the last few years, producer Chana Joffe-Walt has been checking in with someone who wears the mantle of being “it” well. She’s a school principal named Teresa Hill.

Reporter Sarah Gibson tells the story of a huge political divide in the tiny town of Croydon, NH –  population 800. She follows local activists as they try to rally everyone to their side in time for a crucial town meeting.

Host Chana Joffe-Walt talks to teachers and principals about the unique challenges the pandemic has created in their daily working lives. (7  minutes)

Protestors came out across Russia after the Ukraine invasion. In this act, that we first broadcast in 2017, we hear from young people who attended anti-government protests that swept through Russia.

Hamza and Brian visit Tahir Alam, the alleged mastermind of a plot to ‘Islamize’ Birmingham’s schools.

As a new high school principal, Dr. Whitfield felt moved by the national renouncement of racism he saw all around him in the wake of George Floyd’s murder.

At Sullivan High School in Chicago, being able to communicate is key. (5 minutes)

Host Ira Glass takes us on a tour of the various ways the pandemic has affected going to college this year.

Producer Chana Joffe-Walt talks to a seventh grader who doesn’t have a seventh grade, or an eighth grade. (11 minutes)

Host Ira talks with a teacher in South Carolina who is just trying to figure out what the first day of school will look like.

In just one year, everything in one ordinary public middle school changed. It went from an incoming class of thirty sixth graders—most of them Black, Latino, and Middle Eastern—to a class of 103 sixth graders.