RadioEd

On June 1, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill into law that bans transgender girls and women from women’s sports teams. The bill, signed at the start of Pride Month, is the latest in an anti-trans legislative trend. A dozen similar bills have passed this year, and state legislatures have considered more than a hundred others, making 2021 a record year for legal restrictions to transgender peo...

Recently, hackers successfully targeted the country’s largest fuel pipeline, the world’s largest meat processor and the New York City transit system. One company even paid the hackers nearly $5 million to recover its stolen data. In the wake of these cyberattacks, the White house warned companies to increase their cybersecurity and formed a Department of Justice task force, which was able to recap...

Infighting in the Republican party intensified this month: Those skeptical of the 2020 presidential election results removed Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney from her leadership post, while a group of more than 100 Republicans have organized a movement to reform their party or splinter off and start something new. Nearly two-thirds of Americans say they have had it with the two party system, according to a...

Over the last year, working moms have experienced serious burnout. Between the pandemic, closed daycare centers and schools, work from home and isolation from support systems, they have had countless challenges to negotiate and too few resources to draw on. We are just starting to understand the toll the pandemic has taken and the long-term implications for women, their families and society as a w...

With plastics overtaking every corner of the planet, from Mount Everest to ocean habitats, consumers have started seeking solutions — everything from recycling and plastic bag bans to antistraw campaigns. But are these solutions moving us closer to a cleaner planet, or is the plastics problem much bigger than we know? Assistant professor Jack Buffington, whose work in supply chain management has d...

Across the U.S., all eyes are on the Derek Chauvin trial, which will decide whether the former police officer is guilty of murdering George Floyd last May. But no one will be listening as intently as the jurors tasked with delivering a verdict. Over two weeks, 12 jurors and three alternates were chosen from a pool of more than 300, and these individuals will hear one of the most high-profile cases...

In the year since COVID-19 shut down the United States, businesses have closed their doors, students and teachers have created virtual classrooms, employees created home offices, and friends and families were separated for months. While the virus spread rapidly across the country, another crisis was growing alongside it: a mental health crisis. A special episode of RadioEd explores the ways we’ve...

Trust in U.S. news media has been in free fall for years. That statement is problematic enough on its face, much less when consumers are in need of accurate information to stave off a global pandemic or choose a president to lead them through. Misinformation has sewn seeds of doubt, grown conspiracy theories and undermined the efforts of public health officials. Kareem El Damanhoury, a professor i...

Last February, a jury found movie mogul Harvey Weinstein guilty of rape and sexual abuse, and ultimately sentenced him to 23 years in prison. The conviction of such a powerful figure marked a watershed moment for the #MeToo movement and left many hopeful that a major move toward justice was on the horizon. But in the 12 months since, how much has truly changed? And how did 2020 alter the outlook?...

Some things change. Some stay the same. Since 2009, the cost of living has risen 20%. But the federal minimum wage hasn't budged — it has sat at $7.25 an hour. After taking control of the White House and Congress, President Joe Biden and Democrats are pushing to more than double the rate to $15. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reports it will lift nearly 1 million people out of poverty...

The U.S. faces a growing threat of domestic extremism, embodied by the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. We wanted to know what it actually means to be an extremist. Is a certain type of person drawn to extremism? What convinces someone to join an extremist group? And how might our own friends or neighbors go down that path? Rachel Nielsen is the director of the Colorado Resilience Collaborative,...

President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration on Wednesday, Jan. 20, will mark the last stop on the transition of power, which has been marked by distrust, misinformation and riots. As he becomes the nation's 46th president, Biden not only faces a deeply divided country but one facing an economic crisis, as well as the deadly coronavirus pandemic. But he’s not the first president to walk such a treache...

Season 2 Teaser

On election night, as voters watching the presidential race tensed up, Jennifer Greenfield breathed a sigh of relief. Colorado voters resoundingly passed Proposition 118, which provides at least 12 weeks of paid family and medical leave to most employees in the state. Though a federal leave law has been on the books since 1993, Colorado joined a list of states pushing the envelope to expand the sc...

In just seven days, voters will cast their final ballots in the 2020 presidential election, and we’ll finally — fingers crossed — learn whether Joe Biden or Donald Trump will be the country's next president. Seth Masket, political science professor and director of DU's Center on American Politics, joins RadioEd to chart all the twists and turns, and explore what post-2020 politics might look like.

As we approach the one-year mark of the coronavirus outbreak, the race for a vaccine is in full swing. Researchers around the world are rushing to find a solution in record time, raising serious ethical questions about distributing a vaccine fairly across the globe. Law professor Govind Persad breaks down the major ethical concerns, the legality of a vaccine mandate and consequences the U.S. may f...

On Nov. 3, experts predict the presidential election will produce the highest voter turnout in at least a century — but a significant chunk of those voters won't be casting their ballot at a physical polling place. Safety concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic have shined the spotlight on the United States Postal Service and its financial struggles, raising questions about whether it can handle an...

The U.S. criminal justice system is under scrutiny as calls for reform grow. In this episode, we take a closer look at the death penalty. We talk its evolution and how the U.S. compares to the rest of the world on capital punishment. University of Denver criminology and sociology professor Scott Phillips shares insights from his latest research on the subject and reveals what his team found about...

Since Donald Trump's upset victory in the 2016 election, skepticism of political polls has grown steadily. After all, the numbers showed Hillary Clinton in the lead from start to finish. Pollster and political analyst Floyd Ciruli talks to us about what happened four years ago, the likelihood of the president eking out a similar victory on Nov. 3, and what it all says about the state of the countr...

This month (August 2020) marks 100 years since the ratification of the 19th Amendment, which gave women the right to vote. While we like to think of this event as a clear turning point in history, the truth is a lot more complicated. Historian Susan Schulten illuminates the complex and often hidden history behind the amendment’s passage — from the crooked path to ratification, to unsung heroes and...

Coronavirus is forcing K-12 educators to reimagine school as students face more uncertainty this fall. What big lessons did we learn from the sudden school shutdown in the spring? How are schools going to address summer learning loss in this new environment? Erin Anderson, a professor in educational leadership, shares how the pandemic is impacting our schools, teachers and students.

Americans who thought coronavirus was no big deal got a rude awakening March 11. That night, the NBA suspended the pro basketball season, and pretty soon every major sport followed suit. Four months later, COVID hasn’t gone anywhere, but pro sports are determined to make a comeback. Brian Gearity, an expert in sports psychology, performance and training, weighs in on the safest way to return to pl...

Americans across the political spectrum have been perched at the edge of their seats awaiting U.S. Supreme Court decisions sure to affect everyday life for millions. Even with newly appointed conservative justices, the court issued a number of rulings that defied expectations. In this episode, we take on three: Louisiana’s anti-abortion law, LGBTQ+ worker rights (skip to 13:05) and DACA (skip to 2...

Wondering what’s up with Trump’s executive order targeting Twitter and the fact-check label it applied to some of his posts? We talk with media, film and journalism professor Derigan Silver about how much weight this executive order holds, the impact social media has on politics and journalism, and the importance of the little-understood Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act.

In response to the murder of George Floyd, American communities have erupted in protests, with people taking to the streets in all 50 states to demand justice, action and change. They are calling for the country to address issues of police violence against black people and the broader system of racial inequity. Apryl Alexander, professor of forensic psychology, calls this moment a turning point an...