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:

Prof. Lorraine Pangle on the Founders, Education, and Civics

This week on The Learning Curve, Lorraine Pangle, professor of political philosophy at the University of Texas at Austin, discusses how the Founding Fathers' grounding in classical and Enlightenment thought helped shape America's Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the role of public education as a wellspring of republican self-government.

U.K.’s Robert McCrum on P.G. Wodehouse, ‘Jeeves & Wooster,’ and April Fools’ Day

In this special April Fools' Day edition of The Learning Curve, British writer and editor Robert McCrum, discusses English comic genius P.G. Wodehouse, his inimitable prose style, and much-needed humor he brought to 1920s and '30s Britain in the wake of World War I and the 1918 flu epidemic.

Ashley Soifer on Microschools, Pods, & Homeschooling

This week on The Learning Curve, Ashley Soifer, Chief Innovation Officer of the National Microschooling Center discusses these innovative schooling options, in which families and innovators are using a wide array of education choices that offer parents flexibility and greater control over how, where, what, and when their children learn.

UVA Prof. Dan Willingham on Learning Science & K-12 Schooling

This week on The Learning Curve, University of Virginia Professor Dan Willingham discusses the psychology of learning, his advocacy of using scientific knowledge in classroom teaching and education policy, and his critique of the “learning styles theory” of education.

UK Oxford’s Sir Jonathan Bate on Shakespeare’s ‘Julius Caesar’

This week on The Learning Curve, U.K. Oxford and ASU Shakespeare scholar Prof. Sir Jonathan Bate, discusses Shakespeare's timeless play Julius Caesar on the Ides of March. Sir Jonathan explains the Roman lessons for American constitutionalism, including warnings against the dangers of dictatorship and civil war.

Lauren Redniss on Marie Curie, STEM, & Women’s History

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Cara and Gerard mark Women's History Month with Lauren Redniss, author of Radioactive: Marie & Pierre Curie: A Tale of Love and Fallout, the first work of visual nonfiction to be named a finalist for the National Book Award.

“The Last Candid Man”: B.U.’s Dr. John Silber

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Cara and Gerard talk with Rachel Silber Devlin about her memoir, Snapshots of My Father, John Silber, which captures the wide-ranging and remarkable life of the late philosopher, teacher, and president of Boston University.

OECD’s Andreas Schleicher on PISA & K-12 Global Education

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Andreas Schleicher, Director for Education and Skills at the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), discusses global K-12 education, skills, and competition.

India Unbound: Gurcharan Das on the Rise of the World’s Largest Free-Market Democracy

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Gurcharan Das, author, public intellectual, and former CEO of Procter & Gamble India, discusses the rise of India since independence to become a thriving, incredibly diverse nation of 1.4 billion people—the world's largest free-market democracy.

Dr. Deborah Plant on Zora Neale Hurston’s Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, Dr. Deborah Plant, editor of the 2018 book Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo" discusses Zora Neale Hurston's work as an anthropologist telling the story of one of the last survivors of the infamous Middle Passage.

George Weigel Discusses Pope St. John Paul II for National Catholic Schools Week

0 Comments
/
This week on The Learning Curve, George Weigel, the biographer of Pope St. John Paul II explores how Karol Wojtyla's education, deep faith, and experiences during World War II shaped his life as a spiritual leader and helped lead to the fall of Communism.

Award-Winning UK Author & Filmmaker Laurence Rees on the Holocaust, Auschwitz, and Remembrance

0 Comments
/
To mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, Laurence Rees, a former head of BBC TV History Programmes and author of The Holocaust: A New History, sheds light on Germany in the 1920s and 1930s and the cultural and political conditions that led to the Holocaust.