New America Podcasts

America: home to Apple Inc., Google, Amazon, and a slew of other powerful and innovative companies that rule the world of technology. The United States can no doubt claim many of the globe’s pioneering big businesses, but there’s also evidence the country faces declining rates of entrepreneurship and ranks far behind many other nations in educating its young people.

Melissa Fisher, Heidi Miller and Liza Mundy discuss the current state of women in the trading and banking world, especially in light of Wall Street's recent crises, and in the context of women's growing economic clout. Produced in collaboration with Slate's Double X

Paul Tough, author of the new book "How Children Succeed," discusses how qualities like grit and curiosity may be critical for low-income students' success in the classroom and beyond. Lisa Guernsey shares thoughts on teacher evaluation for both sides of the Chicago teachers' strike. Guernsey is joined by Alex Holt to introduce a new data project from the Early Education Initiative and the Federal Education Budget Project.

Michael Waltz explores the controversy surrounding the recently published ex-Navy SEAL book about the Osama Bin Laden raid, and Amy Laitinen explains how the credit hour – a ubiquitous metric never meant to measure learning – is threatening America's educational standing in the world. Elizabeth Weingarten hosts.