When the District 28 diversity planning process came around, many Chinese parents had already been activated a year earlier by the fight to defend the Specialized High School Admissions Test. In this episode, we ask why gifted education gets so much attention, even though it affects relatively few students. How do we even define what it means to be "gifted"? And by focusing on these programs, whose needs do we overlook? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR P...
Jul 01, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Ep. 355
Tens of thousands of children were adopted from other countries by parents in the U.S., only to discover as adults a quirk in federal law that meant they had never been guaranteed American citizenship. Much like the Dreamers, these adoptees are now fighting for legal status to ensure they can stay with the only homes and families they've ever known. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Jun 29, 2022•35 min•Ep. 354
In some ways, this entire season was prompted by the parents who organized against diversity planning in School District 28. So in this episode, we're going back to that one ugly meeting, where they unleashed their fear and anger into the rest of the community. So who are these parents, what do they believe and why? Moreover, why were they ready to fight so hard against a plan that didn't exist? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Jun 24, 2022•59 min•Ep. 353
It's the second year that Juneteenth has been a federal holiday — which means it's getting the full summer holiday treatment: sales on appliances, branded merchandise, and for some, a day off of work. But on this episode, we're talking about the origin of the holiday — and the traditions that keep its history alive for Black folks around the country. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Jun 19, 2022•33 min•Ep. 352
Though a lot of parents and educators agree there needs to be some change in District 28, the question remains: what kind of change? When we asked around, more diversity wasn't necessarily at the top of everybody's list. In fact, from the north and south, we heard a lot of the same kind of thing: "leave our kids where they are and give all the schools what they need." We went to the Southside and asked parents and school leaders directly, what do the schools need? Learn more about sponsor messag...
Jun 17, 2022•56 min•Ep. 351
A new book by Linda Villarosa looks at how racial bias in healthcare has costs for all Americans. Spoiler: Poverty counts — but not as much as you'd think. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy
Jun 15, 2022•29 min•Ep. 350
Code Switch's Kumari Devarajan found an unlikely demographic doppelganger in D'Lo, a comedian and playwright whose one-person show about growing up as a queer child of immigrants in the U.S. is reopening on a bigger theater stage. But when you share so much in common with a stranger who is putting their sometimes messy business on front street for the world to see, it can feel like they're also sharing your secrets, too. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR ...
Jun 08, 2022•31 min•Ep. 349
Until recently, School District 28 in Queens, N.Y., was characterized by a white Northside, and a Black Southside. But today, the district, and Queens at large, has become what is considered to be one of the most diverse places on the planet. So how did District 28 go from being defined by this racial binary, to a place where people brag about how diverse it is? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Jun 03, 2022•54 min•Ep. 348
In the wake of violence and tragedies, people are often left in search of ways to feel safe again. That almost inevitably to conversations about the role of police. On today's episode, we're talking to the author and sociologist Alex Vitale, who argues that many spaces in U.S. society over-rely on the police to prevent problems that are better addressed through other means. Doing so, he says, can prevent us from properly investing in resources and programs that could make the country safer in th...
Jun 01, 2022•32 min•Ep. 347
So much of the present day conversation about District 28 hinges on the dynamic between the Northside and the Southside. But why were the North and the South wedged into the same school district to begin with? When we asked around, no one seemed to know. What we do know are the consequences. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
May 27, 2022•51 min•Ep. 346
Millions of Syrians have been displaced by ongoing civil war. In her new book, Refuge , Heba Gowayed follows Syrians who have resettled in the U.S., Canada and Germany. She argues that finding their footing in their new homes is less about individual choice and more about governmental systems. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
May 25, 2022•42 min•Ep. 345
In the early 1970s, Forest Hills, Queens, became a national symbol of white, middle class resistance to integration. Instead of public schools, this fight was over public housing. A fight that got so intense the press called it "The Battle of Forest Hills." How did a famously liberal neighborhood become a hotbed of reaction and backlash? And how did a small group of angry homeowners change housing policy for the entire country? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoic...
May 20, 2022•59 min•Ep. 344
Utang na loob is the Filipino concept of an eternal debt to others, be it family or friends, who do a favor for you. It goes back to pre-colonial times in the Philippines, and can pass from one generation to another. And some Filipino-Americans want to do away with utang all together, especially when it butts up against "American" values of independence and self-reliance. On this week's episode, we break down this "debt of the inner soul" — and discover a surprising side to this value. Learn mor...
May 18, 2022•44 min•Ep. 341
School District 28 in Queens, N.Y., has a Northside and a Southside. To put it simply, the Southside is Black and the farther north you go, the fewer Black people you see. But it wasn't always like this. Once the home to two revolutionary experiments in integrated housing, the Southside of the district served as a beacon of interracial cooperation. So what happened between then and now? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
May 11, 2022•50 min•Ep. 342
In 2019, a school district in Queens N.Y., one of the most diverse places on the planet, is selected to go through the process of creating something unexpected: a diversity plan. Why would the school district need such a plan and why were some parents so adamantly opposed? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
May 04, 2022•58 min•Ep. 341
Coming soon to the Code Switch feed: School Colors , a limited-run series about how race, class and power shape American cities and schools. Hosts Mark Winston Griffith and Max Freedman take us to Queens, N.Y. – often touted as the most racially diverse place in the world. In 2019, a Queens school district announced that they were chosen to get a "diversity plan." One reaction from local parents? Outrage. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
May 02, 2022•3 min•Ep. 340
Some call it a riot. Some call it an uprising. Many Korean Americans simply call it "Sai-i-gu" (literally, 4-2-9.) But no matter what you call it, it's clear to many that April 29, 1992 made a fundamental mark on the city of Los Angeles. Now, 30 years later, we're talking to Steph Cha and John Cho — two authors whose books both center around that fateful time. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Apr 27, 2022•51 min•Ep. 339
How can anything be more important than what's happening right now? That's the question a woman named Evelyn Wang is pondering right before she is thrust into a surreal, sci-fi multiverse, in the movie "Everything Everywhere All At Once." On the other side — googly eyes, talking rocks, people with hot dog hands — and an exploration of the dynamics between three generations in a Chinese immigrant family. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Apr 20, 2022•26 min•Ep. 338
In the 70s and 80s, Fashion Fair was an iconic cosmetics company designed to create makeup for Black women of all shades. This is the story of that company's meteoric rise, its slow decline, and the two women who think they can resurrect it once more. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy
Apr 13, 2022•25 min•Ep. 337
What do you do when all your options for school kind of suck? That was the question some folks on the Standing Rock Reservation found themselves asking a couple of years ago. Young people were being harassed in public schools, and adults were worried that their kids weren't learning important tenets of Lakota culture. So finally, a group of educators and parents decided to start a brand new school, unlike any others in the region. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adch...
Apr 06, 2022•36 min•Ep. 336
Lindy Hop is a dance that was born in Harlem in the 1920s and 1930s — created and performed by African Americans in segregated clubs and dance halls. But today, one of the world's most vibrant Lindy Hop communities is in Sweden. So what happens when a Black American wants to learn the art form that she first encountered at the hands of her great-grandmother? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Mar 30, 2022•43 min•Ep. 334
It is probably the most radioactive word in the English language. At the same time, the N-word is kind of everywhere: books, movies, music, comedy (not to mention the mouths of people who use it frequently, whether as a slur or a term of endearment.) So on this episode, we're talking about what makes the word unique — and how the rules about its use line up with other words. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Mar 23, 2022•37 min•Ep. 334
This week marks the one year anniversary of a deadly shooting spree in Atlanta, where eight people were killed. Six of those people were Asian American. That violence came after Asian American organizers had been trying, for months, to sound the alarm over a dramatic spike in reports of anti-Asian racism. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Mar 16, 2022•32 min•Ep. 333
Gene Demby and comedian Hari Kondabolu are both new fathers, and they're both learning to raise kids who will have very different identities and upbringings than their own. It's left both of them reflecting on some big questions: How will they teach their children about race? What are the elements of their childhoods that they want to pass on? And what, exactly, is a father anyway? Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Mar 09, 2022•28 min•Ep. 332
Figure skating has always been about flair and drama. But what happens on the ice is nothing compared to what goes on behind the scenes. This week, with the help of our friends at the Blind Landing podcast, we're telling the story of Mabel Fairbanks. Fairbanks was a Black and Seminole figure skater who spent her career training figure skaters of color — while navigating the complicated racial and social dynamics that characterized the sport. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoic...
Mar 02, 2022•39 min•Ep. 331
At the height of his career, Bill Cosby was one of the most famous men in the United States. He was the biggest and highest paid star in the country, and with his image plastered on billboards, advertisements and television, many people felt like they knew him. Of course, few people really knew Bill Cosby. And many of the people who had seen who he was up close would be traumatized for the rest of their lives. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Pol...
Feb 23, 2022•41 min•Ep. 330
In 2020, nearly 20% of Americans turned to therapy. Many of those people were looking for a space to process some of the big, painful events they were living through, including the pandemic, a contentious election cycle, and of course, the summer's racial reckoning. But that had us wondering: What exactly can therapy accomplish? Can it mitigate the effects of racism? Help us undo how we internalize racial trauma? Today, we're sharing the stories of two Latinx people who tried to use therapy as a...
Feb 16, 2022•32 min•Ep. 329
Live from your computer screens, it's Code Switch! Guest hosts Ayesha Rascoe and Denice Frohman joined us to talk poetry and humor with special guests Paul Tran and Hari Kondabolu. Then, Ayesha and Denice answered your questions about race and love. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy
Feb 09, 2022•36 min•Ep. 328
In Canada, tensions between indigenous fishermen and commercial fishermen have been simmering for decades. On today's bonus episode, from our friends at NPR's Planet Money team, we travel to Nova Scotia to figure out how a group of Mi'kmaw fishermen asserted their rights to fish and what happened when commercial lobsterman struck back hard. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Privacy Policy...
Feb 07, 2022•25 min•Ep. 327
It's Black History Month, which is likely to bring boundless stories of Black Excellence and Black Firsts. So today on the show, we're talking about Constance Baker Motley — a trailblazing civil rights judge who paved the way for many to come after her (including, perhaps, the next Supreme Court justice?) But, as we learned, Motley's life was full of contradictions, and her many achievements also came with many costs. Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoices NPR Pri...
Feb 02, 2022•34 min•Ep. 326
