The Round Table: A YVote Podcast

At this week's Round Table, Inica Kotasthane and Riya Mehta speak with Fritz Umbach, Associate Professor of History at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. Fritz studies the history of crime and policing and consults for a number of city agencies and served as an expert witness in a number of Stop, Question, and Frisk--or SQF-- cases. We discuss what SQR is, its history in New York City, whether...

Riya Mehta laments the current debate struck the, which lends itself to sound bite culture over substance. While there’s not a perfect way to do it, she notes that 1:1 debates would certainly help...

Inica underscores that when it comes to public speaking, being eloquent is an advantage Stuttering leads to losing interest and trust. At root, the debate is show business...

Inica Kotasthane shares her concerns as a high school debater about attacks on candidates’ character—while also recognizing that the election is about more than just policy issues—it IS about the character of the person we’ll be electing

At this week's Round Table, Inica Kotasthane and Riya Mehta--ace high school debaters-- discuss their views on the debates to date, the strengths and limitations of the form, and ideas for how the process could be improved to really illustrate what candidates know and where they stand. Here’s hoping to see some of these reflected in 2024… Thanks for joining us!

Riya Mehta describes Portugal’s response to drugs—and the impact their policies have had

Nicholas Stefanidis talks about public health options that have been tried and what gets in the way of them being funded and sustained

Guest Nicholas Stefanidis explains HOW the crisis started—and how the political process (and lobbyists...) have gotten in the way of solving it

At this week's Round Table, Julianna, Riya, and Sara chat with friend of the pod Nicholas Stefanidis about drugs. Yes, drugs--pot legalization, opioid addiction, the real deal with vaping.  We examine various dimensions--historic, physiological, economic, and legal/political-- exploring their impact today and implications for the future. Thank you for joining us!

Tujiza talks about the politics of refugees and the need for governments to look at refugees through the perspective of displacement and the need for homes

Tujiza Uwituze discusses the lack of support for displaced populations

At this week's Round Table, Sara Chough, Julianna Davis, and Riya Mehta speak with Tujiza Uwituze, East Africa Representative for the Global Education Movement (GEM) at Southern New Hampshire University, focusing on one of the foremost human rights--education--as it plays out in Rwanda, as part of our ongoing series on human rights around the world. Thanks for listening!

Michael Jackson underscores the importance of understanding structure and history—and race— while not feeling overwhelmed and disempowered.

Michael Jackson of the Center for Community Change grounds the BLM movement in history and societal forces

At this week's Round Table, Riya Mehta speaks with Michael Jackson , political analyst and researcher with the Center for Community Change , about the Black Lives Matter movement-- and other social movements like #MeToo-- and their strengths and limitations in bringing about change while also reflecting on our organizational goals of civic discourse and trying to work across differences and divide...

Meirav Solomon talks about the challenges of building bridges through dialogue in the context of trauma, and the power of bonding with people with very different lived experience-- through stories and developing a deep state of empathy--and exploring one's own identity by living through the conflicts of others.

At this week's Round Table, Olivia Becker, Leyla Jacoby, and Meirav Solomon talk about their experiences at Seeds of Peace , an international leadership development program that inspires and cultivates new generations of global leaders in communities divided by conflict by equipping exceptional youth and educators with the skills and relationships they need to accelerate social, economic, and poli...

Declan talks about how people engage with views radically different than their own at SEGL

Declan Rexer shares an overview of what makes SEGL SEGL

At today's Round Table, Julianna, Maggie, and Riya speak with Declan Rexer and  Harjap Singh, recent alumni of the School for Ethics and Global Leadership , a semester program to provide intellectually motivated high school juniors who represent the diversity of the United States with the best possible opportunity to shape themselves into ethical leaders who create positive change in our worl...

Olivia discusses the importance of historical context and cultural context in digesting news and the world around us, and Joel talks about how SHEG is equipping students for these challenges and opportunities

At this week's Round Table, Olivia, Sara, and Jade speak with Joel Breakstone, Director of the Stanford History Education Group (SHEG) about how to educate young people--and all people--to be critically literate, savvy consumers and media in order to be informed, engaged citizen contributors to our communities. Non-Spoiler Alert: we all need to read like fact checkers now... Check out SHEG's (free...

Alexandra Madaras shares concerns about how young people are and aren’t being involved in local political parties

High school senior Alexandra Madaras talks about her experiences as a young person working in politics in Ohio.

At today's Round Table,  Olivia Becker, Julianna Davis, Riya Mehta, and Maggie Yu speak with Alexandra Madaras, editor in chief of the Next Generation Politics blog , about her recent article Not Voting is Not Caring and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves and engage in deep conversation about youth political participation, social media, civic education, and lots, lots more. Thank you for joining us...