2021 FALL EDUCATION DOCS
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APM Reports is a collection of investigative journalists and documentary producers, editors, researchers and digital producers dedicated to producing high quality reporting on issues that are often shrouded from public view.
Contact Marge Ostroushko at mostroushko@gmail.com with any questions or to confirm carriage.
Overview
APM Reports is a collection of investigative journalists and documentary producers, editors, researchers and digital producers dedicated to producing high quality reporting on issues that are often shrouded from public view.
Length
One hour each.
Show Clock
Resources
Fading Beacon: Why America is losing international students
Karin Fischer: Karin is a correspondent for The Chronicle of Higher Education, where she writes about international education, colleges and the economy, and other topics. She also is a research associate at the Center for Studies in Higher Education at the University of California at Berkeley and an international education leadership fellow at the University at Albany.
Sasha Aslanian: Sasha is a producer and correspondent for APM Reports, where she has covered education, human trafficking and criminal justice among other issues. She previously worked for American RadioWorks and Minnesota Public Radio News, where her work has been recognized with a George Foster Peabody Award and an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award among others. She is a graduate of Grinnell College.
Who Wants to Be a Teacher?
Alex Baumhardt: Alex produces APM Reports' Educate podcast along with national radio documentaries. She has reported from the Arctic to the Antarctic for national and international media and is an alumna of the U.S. Fulbright program, IE Business School and the Missouri School of Journalism.
Will Craft: Will is a data reporter for APM Reports and the podcast In The Dark. He is an alumni of the University of Chicago and recipient of two George Foster Peabody awards, the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award, an Edward R. Murrow award, and the George Polk Award.
Under Pressure: The college mental health crisis
Alisa Roth: Alisa is the mental health correspondent for APM Reports, a Rosalynn Carter Mental Health Journalism Fellow and the author of Insane: America's Criminal Treatment of Mental Illness. She has been a Soros Justice Fellow, Fulbright scholar and her work has appeared in many outlets, including NPR, The World, The New York Times, and The New York Review of Books.
Sasha Aslanian: Sasha is a producer and correspondent for APM Reports, where she has covered education, human trafficking and criminal justice among other issues. She previously worked for American RadioWorks and Minnesota Public Radio News, where her work has been recognized with a George Foster Peabody Award and an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award among others. She is a graduate of Grinnell College.
Fading Beacon: Why America is losing international students
Broadcast window: August 3, 2021 - June 30, 2022
This hour explores a sea change in the number of foreign students attending U.S. colleges. Colleges and universities in the United States attract more than a million international students a year. Higher education is one of America’s top service exports, generating $42 billion in revenue. It’s money those institutions need, given the drop in public funding for higher education. After the Great Recession, a rapid rise in full-pay international students, especially from China and India, helped make up for the loss of public support. But the money spigot is closing.
The pandemic, visa restrictions, rising tuition and a perception of poor safety in America have driven new international student enrollment down by a jaw-dropping 72%. Tuition dollars aren’t the only loss. In the past, international exchanges served as a form of diplomacy, forging ties between the United States and other countries.
In this hour, we team up with Karin Fischer of the Chronicle of Higher Education to trace America’s rise as a global beacon for higher education and examine what’s lost as that changes.
Who Wants to Be a Teacher?
Broadcast window: August 11, 2021 - June 30, 2022
Many schools around the country are struggling to find enough teachers. Large numbers of teachers quit after a short time on the job, so schools are constantly struggling to replace them. The problem is particularly acute at rural schools and urban schools. The most common level of experience of teachers in the United States now is one year on the job. At the same time, enrollment in teacher training programs at colleges and universities is plummeting, and schools are looking to other sources to fill classrooms.
In Nevada, a desperate need for teachers this year led to allowing people with just a high school diploma to fill in as substitutes. Oklahoma recently changed its law to allow people with a bachelor’s degree - in anything - to teach indefinitely on emergency teaching certificates. Schools in Texas are increasingly turning to for-profit teacher training programs. Data we obtained shows that nearly one in four of the teachers hired in Texas last year came through a single for-profit online program – one that’s now making its way into other states. We’ll look at the implications of these changes, both for children and for the teaching force.
Under Pressure: The college mental health crisis
Broadcast window: August 19, 2021 - June 30, 2022
Even before the pandemic, campus counselling services were reporting a marked uptick in the number of students with anxiety, clinical depression and other serious psychiatric problems. A 2019 survey found that 66 percent of college students felt overwhelming anxiety during the last year. Almost half felt so depressed that it was difficult to function. Some 13 percent seriously considered suicide. Students and parents are pressing colleges to provide more support and accommodations for students with mental health challenges.
College administrators are feeling pressure to do more to retain students whose mental health issues might otherwise lead them to drop out – and to ensure that students don’t harm themselves or others. This collaboration between APM Reports and the Call to Mind project asks: What is a college’s responsibility for helping students navigate mental health challenges, and how well are colleges rising to the task?
Broadcast Rights
Full broadcast rights for this program can be viewed and downloaded here. Prior to carrying this series, stations must confirm carriage with American Public Media.
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