Have You Heard

Have You Heard talks to Audrey Watters, journalist and expert in all things #edtech, about "teaching machines," and the long (and almost completely ignored) history of efforts to automate the teaching profession.

Nearly a decade has passed since Scott Walker took on teachers and other public employees in Wisconsin, virtually eliminating their right to engage in collective bargaining. So what's the state of the state today? Public education and the question of how to fund it has emerged as a potent political issue and is driving what could be a big shift in the state's political makeup.

What does the ratification of the 14th Amendment in 1868 have to do with the wave of teacher walkouts sweeping the country today? More than you might think! Law professor Derek Black steps into the Have You Heard studio to talk about a forgotten history and why it's more relevant today than ever.

Have You Heard looks at what's behind state takeovers of school districts. As guest Domingo Morel explains, laws authorizing states to take over urban districts appeared as a direct response to Black power at the municipal level. Today, while takeovers come shrouded in the discourse of "achievement," the conservative logic behind them is unchanged: improving schools requires weakening the political power of the communities they are in.

Have You Heard discusses the rise of the "data boyz," the quantitative methodologists who increasingly determine what counts--and what doesn't--in education research. Special guest: UC Berkeley economist Jesse Rothstein.

Have You Heard talks to teachers in West Virginia (lots of them!) about the strike that shuttered schools in the Mountain State for nine days - and what they think teachers in other states can learn from their powerful example.

Student walkouts, strikes and protests have a long history of forcing real political change. We talk to historian Jon Zimmerman about what today's student protesters can learn from previous generations. And we hear from current students who are leading the protests against gun violence.

For working class students, "college" is defined as skills building and workforce development. But that's a narrow and ultimately limiting view of what higher education is for, guest Mike Rose tells us. The star of this episode: Maya Luna - a home health aide who went back to school in hopes of earning more money, and discovered that she is a star.

It's been one year since Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos squeaked into office via a tie-breaking vote courtesy of VP Mike Pence. Jack and Jennifer listened, read and watched their way through a year's worth of DeVos remarks - and lived to tell the tale. Their top takeaways: after 365 days of DeVos, she remains misunderstood and misunderestimated.

We talk to Rebecca Klein, education reporter for the Huffington Post, about her recent series on what students at voucher schools - private schools, overwhelmingly religious, that receive taxpayer dollars. Klein introduces us to three popular curricula used in the schools. As she explains, kids on the receiving end of these widely-used lessons are being schooled in an extreme religious and ideological worldview.