Examining Freedom Schools
Have you ever heard of the “summer slide”? This is the term that teachers and educational experts use to describe student’s knowledge loss that can happen over the summer months when they’re not in school. This is especially true this year, when the coronavirus pandemic kept children out of school for much longer than the […]
Stuff YOU Should Know
Back to School–Sort of “Back to school” can always be stressful. But this year it comes with a new set of challenges. School district leaders must make difficult decisions about whether to begin the school year in-person, remotely, or in a hybrid combination of these two directions. All plans bring with them their own difficulties. […]
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Cease Fire in Idlib, Syria The deadly civil war in Syria has been going on since 2011, but it feels like forever. Is it possible that it might finally be drawing to a close? Last week, Turkey and Russia agreed to a cease-fire in Syria’s Idlib region–an area where nearly a million people have displaced […]
California Apologizes for Japanese Internment
This week’s story update on Election Central looks at California’s public apology regarding Japanese internment in the 1940s. Is it ever possible to make up for the major historical wrongs of the past? This week, the state of California is attempting to do just that: by issuing a formal apology for the Japanese internment camps […]
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California Tackles Homelessness Crisis Widespread homelessness can sometimes feel like an impossible problem to solve. But in the wake of receiving a troubling report from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recently, the governor of California has decided to make a bold attempt at tackling his state’s homelessness problem: by declaring a […]
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Boeing Grounds Faulty Planes You may remember the two major fatal airline crashes that occurred in the last couple of years: one into the Java Sea in October 2018, and the other in Ethiopia in March 2019. Together, these two crashes took 346 lives. Both planes were the same type: the Boeing 737 Max jetliner. […]
California Takes a Stand on Fracking
You’ve heard of fracking, or hydraulic fracturing–the process by which oil and natural gas are removed from the earth by shooting a high-pressure water, sand, and chemical mixture into the rock deep inside the earth, pushing the oil and natural gas to the surface. It’s a highly controversial drilling technique with potentially serious environmental consequences. […]
Mandatory Power Outages Fail to Stop California Wildfires
Devastating wildfires in California have become so commonplace that they barely make national headlines anymore, despite causing catastrophic damage, loss of property, and loss of life. A large utility company, Pacific Gas & Electric Corp., has been blamed in the past for not properly maintaining power lines and transmitters, and that this poor care has […]
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Solving the Poverty Problem If you had to take a guess, how long would you say it would take to end world poverty? A hundred years? A thousand? Actually, the unofficial global “deadline” to end world poverty has been set at 2030. And it looks like we’re not going to make it. In 2015, a […]
California vs. Trump
Despite continuing pleas from Democrats and ongoing legal battles, Donald Trump still refuses to release his tax returns. The state of New York even tried to sue for them, but that case remains tied up in court. Now, the state of California has responded by creating a new and controversial law that may even change […]