The Seed Field

As American public schools become increasingly diverse, tens of millions of children find themselves navigating systems that weren’t designed with their backgrounds and cultures in mind. Beyond the U.S. the problem can be even more stark—because American approaches, even when flawed, have ripple effects worldwide. Today’s guest, Syntia Santos-Dietz, says that school counselors are especially situa...

The profession of school counseling has evolved over the last forty years to encompass not just academic and career guidance but also social-emotional support for students and the entire school. Yet too often today the core work of school counselors gets pushed to the side, displaced by demands that they fill in as substitute teachers, substitute principals, and even recess monitors. According to...

Innovation. Resilience. Joy. These concepts are not always top of mind when we think about the climate crisis. Is that a problem? Today’s guest, the scholar, educator, and leader Abigail Abrash Walton, says that taking action like this can be an antidote to despair. In fact, this kind of small, local action might be the only thing that will help us break our dependence on fossil fuels and build a...

As mental health professionals grapple with racism and exclusion in some of their foundational texts and concepts, a movement of reformers is working to decolonize the field. But what does that look like? And how will it impact our communities? In this episode we gather the voices of seven different faculty members from across Antioch University’s counseling, psychology, and therapy programs—and h...

The practice of mindfulness is increasingly popular, even showing up in school curricula and employee wellness programs, where it’s often presented as a tool for managing stress. But Susan Dreyer Leon says that for teachers in particular, mindfulness offers much more than just a stress reduction. In this conversation, we discuss how mindfulness can offer a valuable approach to help us be less reac...

In this special Big Idea episode, our editor Johanna Case revisits three of our favorite Seed Field Podcast interviews about creative writing and pulls out advice and wisdom that’s useful not just for writer but for anyone making art and making a life as an artist. From MFA Chair Lisa Locascio Nighthawk’s reflections on writing from a place of emotional truth to Colette Freedman’s  advice for writ...

As extremist school boards ban thousands of books, Republican governors restrict what subjects can be taught, and red-state legislatures seek to make English the only language allowed in public classrooms, questions of how literacy is defined and taught have only become more contested over the last two years. That’s why today we’re re-releasing this conversation with literacy scholar Heather Chene...

Universities across the country are offering more and more classes outside of degree programs. These include job training programs for employers, continuing education credits required to keep certifications, and more creative classes that serve a personal interest. But why should universities be the place where we go to be life-long learners? And how do universities need to change to embrace this...

A special panel of three educators convened to discuss the future of education, the interesting and rewarding careers that can be had in the field, and the ways that these Antiochians are pushing forward both pedagogy and institutions. Featuring PhD in Leadership and Change alum Ashley Benson, current EdD student Dani Belvin, and MEd alum Ally Muir. ––––––––––––––––––––––––––––– Visit Antioch’s we...

There’s a quiet epidemic wiping out school librarian positions across the U.S. Between 2015 and 2019, the number of librarians declined by 20%, and one in five school librarian positions was eliminated entirely. But why is nobody noticing? According to researcher and Antioch faculty Deb Kachel, it might be because there hasn’t been a nationwide data set showing the staggering numbers—until now. In...

For those of us who have been shut out of higher education in the past, the path back to being a successful student is full of obstacles. The right support can make this a little easier, though.  In this episode, we explore this question with Russell Thornhill and Kathryn Pope, the Co-Directors of the BRIDGE program on Antioch’s Los Angeles campus—a financially free program that has helped over 70...

For many Americans, a college degree is seen as a path to a better job. But higher education is not just about career advancement. It’s also about developing the life of the mind, critical reflection, and a love of learning. Often, says guest Ingrid Ingerson, those students who have experienced educational trauma and had interrupted studies are those most positively impacted by the chance to study...

It can be hard to find time and emotional space within our busy lives to sustain a creative writing practice. At the same time, writing offers a key space to process and make sense of our experiences. Navigating the writing life is a productive challenge, says this week’s guest Lisa Locascio Nighthawk, the Chair of the Antioch MFA in Creative Writing. In this wide-ranging conversation, she touches...

20% of people live with dyslexia, yet our public school systems are for the most part designed for students who don’t have difficulty reading. In the past thirty years, the science around dyslexia has come a long ways. Today, those who can access early screening, early diagnosis, early intervention, and appropriate accommodations are often able to thrive academically and in future careers. But man...

 “Emotions are neurohormones,” says Joshua Freedman. “And these little chains of chemical affect every living cell in our brains and bodies.” But for as much power as emotions have over our lives and selves, too often our educational systems emphasize subject area mastery over cultivating emotional intelligence. Freedman is the perfect person to talk to about this, because for the last 25 years ha...

Visit Antioch University’s website to learn more about the Master of Business Administration program that Kenneth Baker helped found and that he currently serves as the chair of.   Guest host Jane Paul teaches in the BA in Liberal Studies at Antioch University’s Los Angeles Campus. Listen to our Seed Field Podcast interview with Jane Paul in S4E7: We Can Build an Equitable Economy By Starting Smal...

Visit Common Thread to read our recent article, “Victoria Chang Wins 2023 Chowdhury Prize in Literature.” Visit our website to learn more about Antioch’s MFA in Creative Writing .  You can purchase the books we talked about in the show, The Trees Witness Everything , Asian American Poetry: The Next Generation , Love, Love , OBIT , and Dear Memory: Letters on Writing, Silence, and Grief . Recorded...

Visit Antioch’s website to learn more about the Santa Barbara-based MA in Clinical Psychology that Mariela teaches in. You can also check out the program’s Latinx Mental Health Concentration that they direct. This episode was recorded March 22, 2023 via Riverside.fm and released April 5, 2023.  The Seed Field Podcast is produced by Antioch University Host: Jasper Nighthawk Editor: Johanna Case Dig...

Visit Antioch’s website to learn more about the PhD in Leadership and Change that LaTanya graduated from.  You can also find more about LaTanya’s dissertation in our recent article, “Dissertation Watch: Dynastic and Generative Intent for First-Generation Black Wealth Creators.”  Learn more about LaTanya’s work at her website .  This episode was recorded March 8, 2023 via Riverside.fm and released...

Since this interview was first released two years ago, Antioch has announced the creation of a new system of colleges and universities, starting with affiliation with Otterbein College. This makes our interview with Chancellor Bill Groves about the role of higher education in promoting democracy only more relevant. So today we’re re-releasing this conversation about how Antioch University’s values...

Jude Bergkamp is a true believer in the potential of psychology to transform lives and help heal society—but he doesn’t believe that this can happen without reconciling the field’s problematic foundations with a knowledge of how systems of power impact practitioners and clients. This insight guides his work directing the Doctor of Psychology program at Antioch’s Seattle Campus as well as his contr...

Visit Antioch’s website to learn more about the the School of Environmental Studies and Sustainability that Kayla is faculty in. It offers study of conservation psychology at the certificate , bachelor’s , Master of Science , and PhD levels . We encourage you also to read Kayla’s paper in Zoo Biology and our Common Thread article looking back at the Co-Design project after its first year.  This ep...

Visit Antioch’s website to learn more about the Certificate in Climate Change Education , the Masters of Education in Educating for Sustainability , and other programs from the School of Education that Paul teaches in. You can download Paul’s dissertation on the UMass Amherst website .  This episode was recorded December 13, 2022 via Riverside.fm and released January 25, 2023.  The Seed Field Podc...

Many of us dream of writing a screenplay that becomes a blockbuster or of having our play open on Broadway. But the worlds of theater and film often seem impenetrable and full of barriers, especially for people from less privileged backgrounds. To learn more about how emerging playwrights and screenwriters can navigate these challenges, we sat down with the writer Colette Freedman. Colette is a lo...

How do we build sustainable, just economies? This is a question that seems to call for big, systemic solutions. But those can feel out of reach and beyond our scale to affect. The activist and educator Jane Paul says that there is another option: while fighting for larger change, we can build small-scale solutions in our communities. From worker-owned cooperatives to land trusts and mutual aid soc...