Editorial Staff

Montse Alvarado on Protecting Religious Liberty in Schools & Society

/0 Comments/in , , /by Editorial Staff
Share on Facebook
Share on Twitter
Share on
LinkedIn
+

This week on “The Learning Curve,” Cara talks with Montse Alvarado, Vice President & Executive Director of the Becket Fund, about the implications of the upcoming U.S. Supreme Court school choice case, Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, the pervasiveness of 19th-century, anti-Catholic Blaine amendments across the country, and some of Becket’s legal victories in high-profile religious liberty cases. Montse also offers encouraging insights from a recent Becket poll on younger generations’ commitment to religious freedom. She shares the inspirational stories of human rights champions recognized by the Becket Fund, such as former Cuban religious dissident and political prisoner Armando Valladares, and the Nobel Prize-winning writer and Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel.

Stories of the Week:

A new partnership between Southern New Hampshire University and charter school networks in Boston, Chicago, and Texas promises to boost college completion rates for their largely low-income, minority alumni. Three Maine families residing in rural communities with no public high school are battling in a federal appeals court for the religious schools their children attend to be included in the state’s out-of-district tuition program. A National Council on Teacher Quality survey of over 100 large school districts shows nearly half offer performance pay based on teacher evaluations – is this the most effective approach to attract and reward excellence?

Newsmaker Interview Guest:

Montse Alvarado joined the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty in 2009 and was named VP & Executive Director in February 2017. With a background in public policy and campaigns, she has led initiatives at Becket in development, communications, strategy, and operations that have helped secure religious liberty victories. Montse has appeared on Univision, CNN en Español, Telemundo, Fox Business, and EWTN. Born in Mexico City, she is fluent in Spanish and French and is a competitive jazz and classical vocalist. Montse earned a Masters from the George Washington University and a B.A. from Florida International University. She tweets @Mmontsealvarado.

Commentary of the Week: The Washington Examiner: “Virginia Walden Ford: Empower Parents with School Choice”

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/op-eds/empower-parents-with-school-choice

Tweet of the Week: CBS New York? @CBSNewYork 1.5.20

Next episode’s guest: Derrell Bradford, Executive Vice President of 50CAN, January 17th  2020

Newslinks:

Chalkbeat: More charter operators are offering a plan B to alumni who drop out of traditional college. Will it work?

https://www.chalkbeat.org/posts/us/2020/01/08/more-charter-operators-are-offering-a-plan-b-to-alumni-who-drop-out-of-traditional-college-will-it-work/

Portland Press Herald: Families argue in appeal that Maine should pay tuition at religious schools

https://www.pressherald.com/2020/01/08/maine-families-argue-in-appeals-court-that-state-should-pay-tuition-at-religious-schools/

NCTQ: How evaluation ratings impact teacher pay

https://www.nctq.org/blog/How-evaluation-ratings-impact-teacher-pay

Get Updates on Our Education Research

Recent Episodes:

Yale’s Pulitzer-Winning Prof. David Blight on Frederick Douglass, Slavery, & Emancipation

This week on “The Learning Curve," Cara Candal and guest co-host Derrell Bradford talk with David Blight, Sterling Professor of American History and director of the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition at Yale University. He is the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning biography, Frederick Douglass: Prophet of Freedom.

UVA Prof. E.D. Hirsch, Jr. on Core Knowledge, Equity, & Educating Citizens

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Cara Candal and Gerard Robinson talk with Professor E.D. Hirsch, Jr., founder and chairman of the Core Knowledge Foundation, professor emeritus at the University of Virginia, and acclaimed author of the books, Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know and How to Educate a Citizen: The Power of Shared Knowledge to Unify a Nation.

Human Rights Advocate Kristina Arriaga on Cuba, Religious Liberty, & Cancel Culture

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Cara Candal and Gerard Robinson talk with Kristina Arriaga, president of Intrinsic, a strategic communications firm, and former vice chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Kristina shares her family’s experiences fleeing Castro’s communist regime in Cuba and other hardships, and how her background has shaped her commitment to religious liberty.

The Institute for Justice’s Michael Bindas on the SCOTUS, Carson v. Makin, & Expanding School Choice

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Cara Candal and Gerard Robinson talk with Michael Bindas, a senior attorney with the Institute for Justice (IJ). They discuss IJ’s 2020 landmark U.S. Supreme Court win in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, and its implications for state Blaine Amendments, bigoted legal barriers that have blocked religious liberty and school choice for over a century, as well as the Maine school tuitioning case, Carson v. Makin, which was recently granted certiorari.

Civil Rights Leader Bob Woodson on 1776 Unites & Race in America

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Cara Candal and Gerard Robinson talk with Robert Woodson, Sr., founder and president of the Woodson Center that supports neighborhood-based initiatives to revitalize low-income communities, as well as author and editor of the May 2021 book, "Red, White, and Black."

Mariam Memarsadeghi on Freeing Iran, Civic Ed, & Immigrant Portraits

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-host Cara Candal and guest co-host Derrell Bradford talk with Mariam Memarsadeghi, senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. Mariam shares remembrances from her early years spent in the Shah’s Iran, and emigration to the U.S. shortly after Ayatollah Khomeini’s revolution in 1979.

Independent Institute’s Dr. Morgan Hunter on Teaching Greco-Roman History to High Schoolers

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Gerard Robinson and Cara Candal talk with Dr. Morgan Hunter, Research Fellow at the Independent Institute in California, and co-author with Dr. Victor Davis Hanson and Dr. Williamson Evers, of the white paper, Is It Time for a “490 B.C. Project”?: High Schoolers Need to Know Our Classical Heritage.

Aurora Institute’s Susan Patrick on Digital Learning Lessons from COVID-19

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Gerard Robinson and Cara Candal talk with Susan Patrick, the President and CEO of Aurora Institute and co-founder of CompetencyWorks. Susan shares observations about the long-term implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for American K-12 education, and the prospects for expanding digital learning.

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Prof. David Hackett Fischer on Paul Revere, George Washington, & American Independence

This week on “The Learning Curve," co-hosts Gerard Robinson and Cara Candal talk with David Hackett Fischer, University Professor and Earl Warren Professor of History Emeritus at Brandeis University, and the author of numerous books, including Paul Revere's Ride and the Pulitzer Prize-winning Washington's Crossing. As America prepares to celebrate the Fourth of July, they review key figures who helped secure independence from Great Britain, including Paul Revere, immortalized in Longfellow’s classic poem, and Founding Father George Washington, known among his contemporaries as the “indispensable man” of the revolutionary cause.

AEI’s Naomi Schaefer Riley on Parenting, Excessive Screen Time, & Religion in American Education

0 Comments
/
This week on “The Learning Curve," Gerard Robinson and guest co-host Kerry McDonald talk with Naomi Schaefer Riley, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and author of several books, including Be the Parent, Please.

New York Times Best Seller Paul Reid on Winston Churchill, WWII, & the Cold War

This week on “The Learning Curve," Cara and guest co-host Kerry McDonald talk with Paul Reid, co-author, with William Manchester, of the New York Times best-selling biography of Winston Churchill, The Last Lion: Defender of the Realm, 1940-1965. Reid shares how he was enlisted to complete William Manchester’s biographical trilogy on the greatest political figure of the 20th century, which became a best-seller.

Nina Rees on the 30th Anniversary of Charter Public Schools in America

This week on “The Learning Curve," Gerard and Cara celebrate the 30th anniversary of charter schools with Nina Rees, President and Chief Executive Officer of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools.