Story: “Crisis and Change: Conversations With Leaders” is produced in partnership by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Stanford Social Innovation Review. In the series, leaders from across the social sector share insights about how they contend with challenging times and societal division. In this episode, Susan Urahn, Pew’s president and CEO, and Sarah Rosen Wartell, president of the Urban Institute, discuss the deepening political polarization, increasing misinformation, and growing mistrust that has affected public debate—and how they find common ground to forge meaningful change for the good.

Political polarization. Climate change. Racial reckoning. Income inequality. A global pandemic. Since 2020, all five of these immense challenges have emerged or deepened, commanding our attention and prompting major societal and cultural shifts. In this special series produced in partnership by The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Stanford Social Innovation Review, we talk with leaders from across the social sector. They take us behind the scenes, sharing approaches and case studies of innovation and resilience during these unprecedented times. 

Stat: 4 in 10: U.S. Census data from 2020 shows that 4 in 10 Americans identify with a race other than White. Story: The demographic landscape in the United States is changing rapidly. In this virtual event rebroadcast, guests from our “Race and Research” season discuss how the country’s growing diversity is driving a new national conversation about race and ethnicity. The event panelists also highlight the challenges and opportunities researchers face when applying a racial and equity lens to data.

Stat: 93%—93% of new COVID-19 cases were caused by the delta variant in the United States by the end of July 2021. Story: The battle against the COVID-19 virus seemed almost won, but the delta variant is now responsible for a new surge of cases. In this episode, we turn again to infectious disease physician Dr. Rebecca Wurtz to learn more about this new variant and what it means for both vaccinated and unvaccinated populations.

Charita Castro, a social science researcher and ambassador for the American Association for the Advancement of Science IF/THEN Ambassadors program, speaks about how to recruit more women and people of color to the STEM fields¾science, technology, engineering, and math¾to strengthen innovation

In this conversation with Fanta Traore, we hear about her work to support and empower Black women in economics, finance, and data science fields through The Sadie Collective. She shares the latest data on how increasing diversity in the economic workforce can help encourage innovative problem solving for society. 

In this bonus episode of our “Race and Research” season, we share an extended talk with Dr. Marie Bernard, chief officer for scientific workforce diversity at the National Institutes of Health, on her experience as a Black female physician and efforts to improve diversity within health care, from at a patient’s bedside to medical research.

Stat: 68%: The percentage of technology experts who express doubt about ethical standards in artificial intelligence systems. Story: Technology driven by artificial intelligence and other data science will lead to life-changing innovation in the coming years. But much of the historical data those innovations will rely on could be biased. In this episode, Lee Rainie, director of internet and technology research at the Pew Research Center, reports on the growing ethical concerns of technology experts about the use of artificial intelligence. And Jeannette Wing, who leads the Data Science Institute at Columbia University, discusses ways scientists are confronting bias and how to use “data for good.”

Stat: 33%—The percentage of people of color who make up America’s STEM workforce. Story: In this episode, we consider the pipeline to the research workforce—higher education. In a conversation with Freeman Hrabowski, president of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), and its vice provost and dean of Undergraduate Academic Affairs, Katharine Cole, we explore how the university supports undergraduate and graduate students from a range of backgrounds and prepares them for STEM careers.

Stat: 99%: The percentage of census tracts in the United States where young black men end up having lower incomes than their white counterparts even though they grew up with comparable family incomes and resources. Story: In this episode of our season on race and research, our guests examine the impact of race on economic mobility. David Williams, of Harvard University’s Opportunity Insights, describes research tools that can help communities improve economic outcomes for families and kids. And the Brookings Institution’s Andre Perry outlines research showing the systemic undervaluing of homes in black neighborhoods and its implications for family wealth, the health of minority-owned businesses, and the tax bases that fund community needs.