Show-Me Institute Podcast

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Brian Kisida, associate professor in the Truman School of Government and Public Affairs and director of Mizzou's Open Minds Initiative, about what's missing from civics education in America. They discuss why current civics assessments test trivia rather than real understanding, why comparing the U.S. to authoritarian regimes could improve civic knowledge, whether teac...

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Avery Frank, senior policy analyst at the Show-Me Institute, and James V. Shuls, senior fellow at the Show-Me Institute and head of the Education Liberty Branch of the Institute for Governance and Civics at Florida State University, about their new report, "Understanding Missouri's Teacher Shortage: Evaluating Missouri's Teacher Pipeline to Inform Future Policy Strate...

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Colyn Ritter, research analyst at EdChoice, about the annual Schooling in America survey. They discuss why public confidence in K-12 education has been declining, the real reasons parents switch their kids' schools, why open enrollment polls at 80 percent support among parents, and what parents think about AI and cell phones in the classroom. Produced by Show-Me Oppor...

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Jon Bassett and Gary Shiffman, founding partners of 4QM Teaching, about their Four Question Method for teaching history and social studies. They discuss why so much history instruction fails to build lasting knowledge, the four questions that structure a well-taught history lesson (what happened, what were they thinking, why then and there, and what do we think about...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/publication/education/missouris-21st-century-public-school-personnel-boom/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

Read the report and visit the data dashboard: https://bit.ly/46gaYZM Susan Pendergrass speaks with Avery Frank, senior policy analyst at the Show-Me Institute, and Cory Koedel, director of education policy at the Show-Me Institute, about their new report on staffing and enrollment trends in Missouri schools over the past 25 years. They discuss why teacher and administrator hiring has grown steadil...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/state-and-local-government/missouris-ongoing-budget-problem/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Robert Enlow, president and CEO of EdChoice, about whether Milton Friedman's ideas still hold up seventy years after Capitalism and Freedom. They discuss why capitalism is losing favor with younger Americans, how regulatory capture rather than free markets is driving the backlash, what declining public school enrollment signals about the future of education, and more....

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Emily Ekins, vice president for policy and society and director of polling at the Cato Institute, about new survey data on Americans' declining civic knowledge and growing openness to socialism. They discuss why younger Americans are less averse to socialism and communism than older generations, what Cato's polling reveals about basic civic knowledge gaps, why the fou...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/state-and-local-government/local-issues-on-the-ballot-in-missouri-this-august/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

On June 26, 2026, while guest hosting Mundo in the Morning on KCMO Talk Radio, Patrick Tuohey, senior fellow at the Show-Me Institute, spoke with Jonathan Whitehead of the Law Offices of Jonathan R. Whitehead LLC, a Lee's Summit-based civil rights attorney, about Kansas City's race- and sex-conscious contracting program. The city's own consultants recently told the council it lacks the legal basis...

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Jude Schwalbach, senior policy analyst at Reason Foundation, about declining K-12 enrollment nationwide and what it means for the future of open enrollment. They discuss why enrollment dropped in 40 states since the pandemic, how districts have responded to increased competition from charter, private, and homeschooling options, why open enrollment tends to cause far l...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/education/technology-and-our-children-theyre-almost-like-addicts/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/economy/the-senior-services-tax-proposal-in-st-louis-county-is-as-bad-as-it-gets/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Thomas C. Albus, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Missouri, about public safety and criminal justice reform in the St. Louis region. They discuss the limits of risk assessment tools in bail decisions, why the city of St. Louis and St. Louis County have such different homicide rates, the case for judicial discretion over algorithmic recommendations, t...

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Chad Aldeman, education policy researcher and founder of Read Not Guess, about Missouri's early literacy crisis and why the legislature has struggled to address it. They discuss what it means for a fourth grader to be below basic in reading, why three-cueing may be harmful to early readers, the science of reading and what it actually prescribes, the case for third-gra...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Read the FAQs Here: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/state-and-local-government/amendment-5-faqs/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This content was produced using AI-generated narration.

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Joseph Haslag, Donald R. Street Endowed Professor and Department Head of Economics at Auburn University, about his new Show-Me Institute report, "Looking for Growth: A Productivity Story." They discuss why Missouri ranks 44th in GDP growth and labor productivity, the case for eliminating the state income tax, why industrial policy tends to fail, the role of higher edu...

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Andy Smarick, senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, about Missouri's education leadership shake-up and what comes next. They discuss how to find the right commissioner of education, why outside reformers tend to succeed where insiders struggle, what the dismantling of the US Department of Education means for state accountability systems, why public complacency abo...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/corporate-welfare/more-noise-than-signal-from-latest-chiefs-release/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

J.C. Bradbury, professor of economics at Kennesaw State University, joined Patrick Tuohey, guest hosting Mundo in the Morning on KCMO Talk Radio, to discuss his forthcoming book This One Will Be Different and why publicly funded stadiums almost never deliver on their promised economic benefits. Listen to the full show: https://www.kcmotalkradio.com/

Susan Pendergrass speaks with Andrew G. Biggs, senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, about the Social Security trustees' latest report and what it means for the program's future. They discuss the projected 2032 insolvency of the retirement trust fund, why the trustees' birth rate assumptions may be too optimistic, the proposed Moreno-Warren plan to eliminate the payroll tax ceiling,...

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/education/missouri-missed-an-opportunity-reading-reform/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/economy/what-if-you-eliminated-personal-property-taxes-and-nobody-noticed/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.

Show-Me Institute Audio Briefs features audio versions of select articles, commentary, and publications from the Show-Me Institute. Learn more at showmeinstitute.org: https://showmeinstitute.org/article/state-and-local-government/if-gun-laws-explain-kansas-citys-violence-what-explains-kansas/ Produced by Show-Me Opportunity This episode was produced using AI-generated narration.