16:1 - Education, Teaching, & Learning

The 16:1 year in review episode for 2025-26 is a creative audio essay co-authored by hosts Katie Day and Chelsea Adams. Set during graduation season, this fictional narrative dedicated to teaching and learning explores quiet moments of a school year’s end: bittersweet transitions, the unseen labor of educators, and anticipation for what comes next. Join us for this creative departure as we take a summer break. We look forward to returning in Fall 2026 with new episodes. Thanks for listening!

In this episode, we examine an ambitious social experiment: the Harlem Children’s Zone (HCZ), a 100+ block area in New York City where an educational philosophy of place-based intervention is being played out. Founded by a charismatic social entrepreneur named Geoffrey Canada, HCZ is a non-profit pursuing an elusive goal: break cycles of intergenerational poverty in Central Harlem with an all-encompassing “cradle to career” support pipeline for students and their families. As Harlem undergoes major economic transformation marked by an influx of global retailers and luxury developments, families within the Zone are wondering: Can neighborhood revitalization coexist with social equity, or does the very success of these interventions accelerate the displacement of the families they were meant to serve?

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Harlem Children's Zone

Waiting for "Superman" - Wikipedia

William Julius Wilson - Wikipedia

Harlem Children's Zone - Wikipedia

Resources PNI

20 more communities chosen in 2011 for the Promise Neighborhoods Program, inspired by the Harlem Children’s Zone®

HCZ Promise Academy Charter Schools

Geoffrey Canada - Wikipedia

Michelle Rhee - Wikipedia

Supporting kids from cradle to career in Central Harlem | Stanford Graduate School of Education

Long-Time Residents Regret Changes in Harlem.

Gentrification – Harlem 350.

Manhattanville Campus Plan

Columbia University proposes the Manhattanville in West Harlem Rezoning and Academic Mixed

The Harlem Children’s Zone: Revitalizing Our Nation Through Education

84M341/HS - 2019-20 School Quality Snapshot - Online Edition - New York City Department of Education

Geoffrey Canada's Biography

A focused exploration of learning leadership in education, schools, organizations, and civic spaces.

Effective leadership emerges from more than simply holding a position of authority; it is a continuous process of learning, adaptation, and cultivating the self and others within an organization. In this episode, we examine educational frameworks that aim to cultivate successful leadership in various contexts, from rigorous principles of military leadership to the sometimes unstructured approaches of social enterprise. We’ll talk about the tension between remaining deeply attached to a mission or to being a certain type of educator and the necessity of preparing others to carry our missions forward.

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Dear listeners: we’ve made it to a major milestone! To mark our 150th episode, we have curated some of our favorite moments from the 16:1 archive— recurring themes and evolving questions on education, teaching, learning, and schools that have defined our six year research journey to date. Thank you for listening, and here’s to the next 150!

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Episode 12 - Ruby Bridges - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 51 - Left Behind - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 108 - Rethinking School Norms: How Industrial History Shapes Modern Education - 16:1

Episode 119 - Confronting Misinformation: Lessons from the Classroom - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 132 - Seattle’s Search for School Equity feat. Vivian Van Gelder - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 134 - The Future of Community News: The Reporting Project at Denison University - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 138 - Culturally Responsive Pedagogy - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 139 - Textbook Wars - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 143 - Inclusive Classrooms (or, On Making Chicken Soup) - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 144 - Writing the Textbook for Emergency Care - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

We’re approaching America’s 250th birthday, and we are asking ourselves tough questions about schooling and democracy through the lens of the influential works of Mortimer Adler, a philosopher, educational reformer & theorist, and advocate for holistic liberal arts education. Adler saw philosophic thinking as a universal responsibility, one that every citizen must undertake in order to uphold healthy democracy and promote civic stability. Adler’s work, often linked with contemporaries like Robert Maynard Hutchins at the University of Chicago, sought to overhaul America’s K-12 and higher education systems by replacing vocational and elective programming with a structured liberal arts approach built on the “Great Books.” In 1982, The Paideia Proposal was published by Adler and fiercely debated by his contemporaries, who sometimes struggled to connect the dots between the practical realities of the American education system and Adler’s blueprints for a more engaged citizenry. Just a few months away from 250, America is feeling like a place where Adler’s most salient questions and challenges have taken on a renewed urgency. How does a nation prepare its citizens for the responsibility of self-governance?

00:25 Intro

03:10 America 250 & Democratic Fragility

06:50 Citizenship, Seminars, & Celebrating Intellectual Diversity

10:00 Engaging Educational Communities for Active Citizenship

12:45 Mortimer Adler: Everyman Philosopher

17:20 Anchored in Aristotle: Adler’s Greek Intellectual Roots

22:00 Education is for Lifelong Learning

27:15 A Guide to Democratic Classroom Teaching: Lectures, Coaching, & Socratic Inquiry

33:45 Reactions from Contemporaries & Enduring Questions

46:45 What We Learned

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

This episode confronts a complexity of the U.S. justice system: education within prisons. What does educational opportunity look like for incarcerated individuals? The sheer scale of incarceration in the United States and devolved, state-by-state control has led to a patchwork system of educational resources that ends up being sometimes at odds with its own rehabilitative goals. Join us for a look at the challenges and systemic failures of correctional schooling and the quiet efforts to address them, which often aim to reduce recidivism and even the bottom line for taxpayers.

00:20 Intro & Announcements

00:00 The Scale of Incarceration in the U.S.

03:30 Federal vs. State Prison Education: Repeatable Process or Patchwork Promises?

12:00 Policy Levers for Improvement & States that Excel (Ohio, California)

18:30 Pell Grant Access

25:00 Incentives, Recidivism, and Privatization

31:00 Teaching in Prison: Qualifications and Challenges

37:00 What We Learned (Mariel Boatlift)

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Did your high school experience feel a little like a relic from another era? Beneath the daily routines of bells and benchmarks is a history of deliberate choices (made by a small number of voices), evolving philosophies, and healthy controversy that evolved through a period of rapid social change. This week, the hosts examine the origins of the American high school system as we know it, prompting critical inquiries into the emergence and evolution of the course and assessment structure that dictates the rhythms of adolescence in the United States. We review the landmark report of the Committee of Ten, an 1892 working group of National Education Association of the United States Committee on Secondary School Studies, which was convened in order to create a framework of educational standards to bring order to the patchwork chaos of secondary schooling in the U.S. left in the wake of the Civil War. We discuss the initial goals of the secondary school system and to what extent original intentions are still serving our students today. The episode also interrogates the notion of a singular “best” teaching or assessment method.

00:15 Intro & Recap of Holocaust Education Museum Exhibit (Cincinnati) and Guided Virtual Tour of Auschwitz-Birkenau

06:50 An Academic Conference with Enormous Power Over American High Schools

10:15 The Report of the Committee of Ten: The Most Important Education Document Ever Issued?

12:00 The Formalizing of Education as a Profession 

14:50 The National Education Association: Convener of Educational Change

16:00 Horace Mann, Common Schooling, & the Evolution of Standards 

19:30 Who Decides What is “Best”? And Better Questions

25:50 Ten After Ten: Retrospective Look & Influence of the Report

30:20 The End of Differentiation & Discussion Questions

40:00 What We Learned

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Sources & Further Reading:

Report of the Committee of Ten on Secondary School Studies : with the reports of the conferences arranged by the Committee

United States. Bureau of Education. Report of the Commissioner of Education Made to the Secretary of the Interior for the Year ... With Accompanying Papers. Washington: G.P.O., 18701928.

Education Reform in Antebellum America | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

The History of NEA

Ten Years' Influence of the Report of the Committee of Ten

Episode 60 - Where No Mann Has Gone Before - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

Episode 40 - A More Perfect Union? - 16:1 - An Education Podcast

NEA Leadership on Teach for America

Cardinal Principles of Secondary Education

The Carnegie Unit

We’re pleased to welcome guest Dr. Maggie Marcus to the podcast. Dr. Marcus joins us for a conversation on bilingual learners, two-way immersion programs, and navigating the needs of English learners from a policy level at a time of increased scrutiny on language learning in relation to civic identity. Dr. Marcus is the Executive Director of the Sullivan Family Charitable Foundation, which is dedicated to improving educational outcomes for English Learners. 

02:30 The Joy of Teaching Aligned to Talent: Dual Language Learning

10:30 Professional Pathways for Language Learners

16:30 Two-Way Immersion Programming: Research & Praxis

22:00 Century Foundation Report: Community Demand for Bilingual Educational Opportunity

27:30 English Learners & Pandemic Recovery Trends 

31:00 What We Learned

Is Your Child Classified as an English Learner? - PIQE

What Families Want: New Data on Public Demand for Bilingual Education

Pandemic Response to Pandemic Recovery: Helping English Learners Succeed This Fall and Beyond

Quadrinity Check-In | Hoffman Institute

Sullivan Family Charitable Foundation

Music by John Williams | GRAMMY® Award Winner | Disney+

Mayor Mamdani Declares Local State of Emergency, Snow Day for NYC Public Schools to Keep New Yorkers Safe

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Learn about the remarkable partnerships that produced more than 2,500 Carnegie‑funded libraries across the United States and the complex, negotiated process that made these institutions enduring pillars of public knowledge. Drawing on contemporary scholarship, the conversation illuminates how local communities, librarians, and decision makers harnessed Andrew Carnegie’s philanthropic energy to shape America’s public library system.

00:30 Intro

03:00 Andrew Carnegie: Immigrant to Titan of American Industry

11:30 Carnegie Libraries Spread Across the Country

24:40 Library Design and Enduring Legacy

30:00 Carnegie’s Vision of Citizenship & the Gospel of Wealth

39:45 What We Learned This Week

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

What does it look like when a community builds critical infrastructure before established institutions recognize the need? In this episode, we examine a short-lived but transformative ambulance program that helped define modern emergency medical response at a time when most U.S. emergency calls were handled by minimally trained personnel. At the intersection of medical research, workforce development, and community trust, this effort, known as the Freedom House Ambulance Service, reframed first responders as field clinicians and demonstrated how on-the-job education can function as public health infrastructure. Learn about the researchers and educators who helped shape early resuscitation science, the culture of embedded learning that accelerated community care, and the institutional shifts that rippled across the country in the wake of the program’s success.

00:30 Intro + Ohio’s changing kindergarten enrollment cutoffs; school & family impact

06:00 Freedom House Ambulance Service: Community-driven transformation in Pittsburgh’s Hill District

13:20 Learning under fire: education and training in the field

17:05 Writing the textbook for emergency medical care

18:30 Building effective learning community in a crisis context

23:20 Rules, restrictions, and mavericks; pushing boundaries to further medical research

25:50 Education as public infrastructure, not credentialing pipeline; the relative value of expertise

27:00 The structure of schools & workplaces for community empowerment

For a full list of episode sources and resources, visit our website.

Freedom House Ambulance Service - Wikipedia

Nancy Caroline - Wikipedia

Peter Safar - Wikipedia

Emergency Medical Services - Wikipedia

America's First Paramedics Were Black. Their Achievements Were Overlooked for Decades

Freedom House Ambulance: The FIRST Responders | America's First EMT Service

How to see Dublin’s secret painting | The Doyle Collection

Freedom House Ambulance Service – EMS Museum

About Us - Freedom House Doc

These Trailblazing Black Paramedics Are the Reason You Don't Have to Ride a Hearse or a Police Van to the Hospital

Send Freedom House! | Pitt Med | University of Pittsburgh

Nancy Caroline Award | Safar Center for Resuscitation Research

The Jewish Woman who Revolutionized Emergency Medicine | Aish

Hellelil and Hildebrand, the Meeting on the Turret Stairs by Frederic William Burton | National Gallery of Ireland

'There's no telescope this large ever built. It's not like we have a precedent for how to do these things,' Giant Magellan Telescope engineers on why they used the Unreal Engine to build an unprecedented telescope simulator | TechRadar