We’re (Almost) Baaack! & Teacher Strike in LA
We hope you had a great holiday, and that rest, renewal, and joy will be yours all year long. Sam and I are almost ready to bring the season in for a landing, starting with the next episode (dropping this...
Real Radicals Ask Questions First
“In almost all major American cities, most Black and Latino students attend public schools where a majority of their classmates qualify as poor or low-income. Such neighborhoods and students are the engines of growth for both charter schools and other...
S1-E5: Cutting School, Listening to Communities (Noliwe Rooks)
At the beginning of her most recent book, Dr. Noliwe Rooks shares a conversation she had over and over with her white, affluent students at Princeton. They called education “the civil rights issue of our time,” and seemed eager and...
Why Grad School Reading Assignments are NEVER Radical
The first time I lived through the Harvard “Case Method” classroom experience, I was invigorated. An entire class where I could compete with my classmates to make the most insightful comment and win the attention (and maybe that TA gig next...
S1-E4: Radical Change, the Harvard Way
“Is there any way to rock the boat without falling out of it?,” is the central question of Debra Meyerson’s article “Radical Change, the Quiet Way,” which Sam and Abram spend this episode discussing. Meyerson’s article seems relevant because it...
From Admirer to Interviewer: A Tale Years in the Making
I was watching Vinny Schiraldi for years before he ever heard our name, let alone came on The Radical Bureaucrat podcast. I lived in DC for two years in the early 2000’s, during which time I worked in city government...
S1-E3: Dream Boldly, Prioritize the Mission (Vinny Schiraldi)
In this week’s episode, Sam and Abram chat with Vinny Schiraldi, who oversaw radical changes running Juvenile Corrective Services in Washington, DC and Directing the NYC Department of Probation. Listen to Vinny explain how, guided by his approach of “acting...
That Time we Borrowed a Fancy Studio
Our first podcast was recorded on a snowy December morning in a beautiful recording studio operated by an Oscar-winning film production company. We really had no business being there. Not knowing where to get started, I put out a request...