At Antioch High School in Contra Costa County, 80 students serve as peer advocates, mentoring freshmen during their transition to high school, meeting with students who have been found with alcohol or drugs, and facilitating mediation between students who are having conflicts.

There's been a surge in school programs like this one, where students counsel or mentor other students. And they seem to be paying off, both for students who receive the mentoring and for the advocates themselves.

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Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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Arizona State University has been expanding its footprint in California for years and some students here say it offered programs they could not have found at California colleges.

But the California Student Aid Commission has denied Arizona State's requests for Cal Grants, saying state law does not open the program to out-of-state public universities.

Guests:

Read more from EdSource: Arizona State navigates financial aid pitfalls of California expansion

Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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California's Assembly Bill 218 made it possible for childhood abuse victims to sue public agencies up to their 40th birthday or five years after discovering the abuse. Advocates say the law has allowed victims to find justice and peace after life-damaging assaults.

The law sparked a flurry of lawsuits, and school districts have had to pay billions of dollars in settlements, with no end in sight. Even districts that have not faced any abuse allegations involving employees are also paying for settlements, because they pool the costs with other districts.

It's created a difficult dilemma.

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Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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Fresno Unified invested $30 million in services for children and families that go beyond traditional academics, from housing assistance and food pantries to digital music production and lunchtime sports programs.

Teachers say the programs are getting students excited about being at school, and addressing some of the barriers that made it hard for them to get to school or to learn once there.

Guests:

Read more from EdSource: Fresno Unified's $30 million investment to support students is paying off

Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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As a saxophonist in Boston’s Klezmer Conservatory Band in 1985, Merryl Goldberg traveled to the Soviet Union to meet up with another group of musicians, The Phantom Orchestra.

The Phantom Orchestra would be sharing more than good tunes with Merryl.  They’d also pass along information, including the names of people who wanted to escape the Soviet Union, which Merryl and her friends would then smuggle back to the United States.

To do this, Merryl made up a secret code, hidden in sheet music.

Now Merryl’s spy days are long behind her. But she is still passionate about how music and other arts can enrich other fields, including cybersecurity.

Guests:

Read more from EdSource: Merryl Goldberg, a music professor on a mission to spread arts education

Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

Fausto Lopez was arrested at 16 years old and ordered to spend seven years in a juvenile facility. But before he had even finished half of that time, he finished high school, got an associate degree and applied to attend a four-year college.

How did this young man find the drive and support to propel him to such academic success? Do other incarcerated young people have the same opportunities?

Guests:

Read more from EdSource: How a young man serving a sentence in juvenile facilities made it out one class at a time

Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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Heather Povinelli, a second grade teacher in Monrovia Unified, was named one of five California Teachers of the Year for 2026. But in college, she almost gave up on her dream of becoming a teacher because she worried that her dwarfism would stop her.

We visited Heather in her Monrovia classroom, where we spoke about how she got back into teaching, how she creates an inclusive classroom, and what she learned conducting research about other teachers with dwarfism.

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Education Beat is a weekly podcast. This week's episode was hosted by EdSource’s Emma Gallegos and produced by Coby McDonald.

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It’s time for a new calendar, new year’s resolutions and new predictions from John Fensterwald.

John is a veteran reporter, with decades of experience reporting on education. At the turn of the year, we at EdSource turn to John to give us a sense of what we have to look forward to — or dread — in education.

Guest:

John Fensterwald, Editor-at-large, EdSource

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Strikes, cuts, state superintendent race: Our 2026 California education predictions. What are yours?

Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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This week we are honoring the life of Betty Reid Soskin, who was the nation’s oldest national park ranger and a civil rights icon. She passed away on December 21st at 104 years old.

To honor her, we are rebroadcasting an episode from 2021, about how a California school district came to rename a school after her.

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Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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In the bilingual education world, José Medina is a superstar. A former teacher turned principal turned researcher, he spreads his message of respecting students' languages on social media and in schools across the country with a sassy, no-nonsense style, telenovela-level energy and strong research to back it up.

Listen to him tell his own story and how his own experiences in childhood fuel his fight for inclusion.

Guest: José Medina, Biliteracy and dual-language researcher

Read more: Meet the researcher using sass and social media to transform bilingual education

Education Beat is a weekly podcast hosted by EdSource’s Zaidee Stavely and produced by Coby McDonald.

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