Teachers' Lounge

On this week’s show: Jay Rehak. He’s an author and Chicago Public Schools language arts teacher. He and his classes at Whitney Young High School are the co-writers of over a dozen student-sourced novels.

On this week’s show: James Cohen. He’s an associate professor of ESL & bilingual education at Northern Illinois University. He’s also a former Fulbright Scholar who has lived in several different countries across the world and most recently taught in Uruguay.

On a new Teachers' Lounge: Trudy DesLauriers. She's a reading specialist at Morris Elementary School who has taught for over 30 years. She also has two golden retriever therapy dogs, Martha and Thelma Lou, who come in to help struggling readers. Once a month, a group of other therapy dogs from greyhounds to goldendoodles join them for their "Sit! Stay! Read!" event.

On this week’s podcast: Maggie Kasicki talks to host Peter Medlin. She teaches English as a Second Language at Rockford University. She also volunteers at schools across Rockford teaching cross-cultural education. They also talked a lot about her traveling, but specifically about how she travels culturally. There's no Holiday Inn, no continental breakfast. Maggie gets straight-up embedded.

Erik Czerwin, language arts & literature teacher at Rockford's Guilford High School, sits down with host Peter Medlin for a wide-ranging discussion of the top education issues of 2019 and what they'll be looking at in 2020.

Rockford's West Middle School principal Maurice Davis sits down with host Peter Medlin on a new episode of Teachers’ Lounge!

This week, we’ve got a retired physical education teacher and girls’ basketball coach.

This week, a really special episode we've been excited about for a while. It’s a conversation with Dick Hart. He’s an 89-year-old retired choral teacher at Downers Grove North High School. He also played trombone in the Army band when he served during Korean War. Dick talked to Peter about all of that, his motto "music is life" and so much more.

This week on Teachers’ Lounge, Illinois High School Baseball Hall of Fame Coach, Neal Bertram! He’s been a coach and P.E. teacher at Rockford Lutheran for over 30 years. He talked to Peter about the joy of watching his kids gain confidence, the huge impact his P.E. teacher and basketball coach had on him, and baseball as an allegory for life.

This week on Teachers’ Lounge, we take a look at the science behind brewing with DeKalb High School biology teacher, Steve Byers. He’s also the owner and brewmaster behind the new Byers Brewing Company in downtown DeKalb. Byers talked with Peter about how he got started brewing in college trying to recreate his favorite discontinued beers. They also discuss how he manages running a small business,...

This week, a conversation with Lissette Jacobson about growing up the daughter of Mexican immigrants, social justice, using football to bond with boys in her school and what it takes to be a successful administrator. She is the new principal of Pioneer Elementary School in West Chicago.

Rich Egger, news director at Tri States Public Radio in Macomb, joins us for a special edition episode of Teachers’ Lounge. Public radio stations across the state collaborated on our “Enrollment Exodus” series chronicling enrollment challenges facing Illinois colleges and universities, especially since the 2015-2017 state budget impasse. I talked to Egger about how enrollment decline at Western Il...

Since returning to DeKalb a decade ago, Maurice McDavid has held many titles. Some call him their teacher, others call him their preacher. To some of his elementary school students, he even goes by his hip-hop moniker, Mr. McDizzle. But above all of that, he's trying to be an advocate in the town he was raised in.

A mother and daughter, they both teach kindergarten at the same school. They come from a long line of teachers in their family. And this year, the next generation is putting on her backpack to share those same halls as she goes into kindergarten herself.

She works with teenagers and young adult students with autism. She also happens to be a comedy writer. And she moonlights on top of that as an indie musician. She says her work has been described as a "girls' night out with Kacey Musgraves and Alison Krauss." On this episode of Teachers' Lounge we talked to Cora Vasseur about how all of that happened, and how her art influences her work with speci...

Teachers’ Lounge is a new podcast from WNIJ telling the stories of education in Illinois with the help of stories from Illinois educators. Join reporter Peter Medlin every other Friday (payday!) for a new episode.

Beginning August 2nd, WNIJ launches a new podcast called Teachers' Lounge on WNIJ telling the stories of education in Illinois with the help of stories from Illinois educators. Join reporter Peter Medlin every other Friday (payday!) for a new episode.