School's In

Karin Forssell, director of the Learning, Design and Technology program at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, explains the purpose of maker spaces and how technology is used in the classroom.

How should policymakers decide how to shape the education system? Research should be a critical starting point, says Heather Hough, executive director of Policy Analysis for California Education. On this episode, she discusses Getting Down to Facts II, which is a new report that provides an analysis of what’s working and not working in California schools.

Michael Frank, associate professor of psychology at Stanford, discusses research on how children learn language and develop speech skills. He shares some tips on what parents and educators can do to provide kids with an excellent environment for learning and understanding language.

Dan Schwartz, Dean of the Stanford Graduate School of Education, talks with his co-host, Senior Lecturer Denise Pope, about college rankings, how they are determined, and whether it is important to choose a school that is high on one of the many lists create college hierarchies.

Shelley Goldman, associate dean for faculty at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, and Piya Sorcar, CEO of the nonprofit TeachAIDS, tell us about concussions during school sports, how to identify them, and talking to students about understanding and reporting concussions.

Teresa LaFromboise, professor of education in Development and Psychological Sciences at Stanford, talks about the challenges facing schools with a predominantly Native American population and how those communities are addressing those problems.

Francisco Ramirez, professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, tells us about the politics behind textbooks and how changes in textbooks reflect a national outlook.

Amika Guillaume of East Palo Alto Academy gives us insight into the daily life of a principal. She also discusses some of the challenges in helping first generation students get into college and the importance of professional development for teachers aiming to improve education outcomes.

Keith Devlin, Stanford mathematician and NPR Weekend Edition “Math Guy," talks about how learning math in the classroom is evolving and why it is more important for students to understand math concepts than it is to repeatedly solve equations.

Ira Lit, director of Stanford’s Elementary Teacher Education Program, discusses how parents can prepare their kids for school and some of the ways teachers can prepare to meet the needs of their students.

Kenji Hakuta, professor emeritus at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, talks about how the Common Core educational standards were set and why standards exist in the first place.

Mitchell Stevens, associate professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, shares his expertise on college path planning and how the use of a web-based tool called Carta is helping students plan their college course trajectory.

Jennifer Wolf, senior lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, discusses young adult literature, banned books, and whether or not it is easy to find the next big hit in the genre that spawned recent classics like Harry Potter and The Hunger Games.

Linda Darling-Hammond, President and CEO of the Learning Policy Institute and professor emeritus at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, shares her top five suggestions to improve America’s schools and prepare students to compete for 21st century jobs.

Ari Kelman, the Jim Joseph Chair in Education and Jewish Studies and associate professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education , discusses religion in schools, the sense of belonging faith creates, and how people learn about religion following an epiphany.

Shashank Joshi, associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Stanford School of Medicine, discusses how schools are tackling mental health issues and how teachers and school staff are being trained to identify at-risk students.

Michael Kirst, California State Board of Education president and professor emeritus of education and business administration at Stanford, shares his insights on how schools are funded and why they are financed that way.

David Labaree, professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, gives us a historical perspective on how and why America’s college and university systems developed from the pre-Revolutionary War times into the present.

Jim Shelton, head of the education arm of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, discusses that organization's efforts to improve education through smart investment.

Janet Carlson, associate professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, talks about her work to improve education in the classroom through professional development offerings for teachers.

Thomas Schnaubelt, the executive director of the Haas Center for Public Service at Stanford, explains how service learning differs from community service, and what benefits students get from combing service and scholarship.

Keith Coleman, Chief Strategy Officer at the Tesla Foundation, a science and tech think tank dealing with autonomous innovations in our culture, sits down for a conversation.

Anne Fernald, a developmental psychologist who directs the Language Learning Lab at Stanford University, explains why it's important to talk to your kids, even when they are infants. Fernald's research shows that babies who are spoken to in an engaging and nurturing way tend to develop faster word processing skills, which helps their development more generally.

Martin Carnoy, professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, says international rankings can mislead the public into believing that America has a terrible education system. Carnoy explains how to understand the rankings, including what to believe and what to be skeptical about.

Benjamin Domingue, assistant professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, talks about his research into the impact your genes might have on your education.