October 8, 2019 - MPR’s Marianne Combs reports on how the Children’s Theatre Company in Minneapolis is being forced to revisit a grim part of its past as it works to resolve lawsuits that charge it with failing to protect young people from sexual abuse.
October 9, 2019 - MPR’s Elizabeth Shockman looks at Hmong for Native Speakers, a school elective taught in Hmong and grounded in Hmong history, culture, and language. It was created at Brooklyn Park’s Park Center High School to bridge a learning gap between culture and classroom academics.
October 11, 2019 - MPR’s Alisa Roth reports that Minneapolis and St. Paul are proposing new city ordinances that would ban gay conversion therapy, the controversial treatment designed to change people’s sexual orientation or sexual identity.
October 21, 2019 - MPR’s Riham Feshir profiles Andrea Duarte-Alonso, who has been documenting the stories of immigrants and their children in southwest Minnesota.
October 25, 2019 - MPR’s Tiffany Bui profiles Yang See, who worked as principal assistant to the liaison between the CIA and the Lao Royal Army under the radio code name “Glass Man” at the height of the Secret War in Laos. As communists seized power in Laos in 1975, he helped Hmong refugees flee the war and find safe harbor.
December 31, 2019 - MPR’s Briana Bierschbach presents a sound montage summary of the biggest polictical story of the decade in Minnesota…the fight for passage of a same-sex marriage bill. Report includes numerous clips of the debate and outcome.
February 19, 2020 - MPR’s Melissa Townsend reports on City of Minneapolis plans for Upper Harbor Terminal and it’s potential impact to community in North Minneapolis. Segment includes interviews with city officials, developers, and city residents.
March 9, 2020 - MPR’s John Enger interviews Native American author Dennis Staples about his first novel, "This Town Sleeps." The story depicts the struggle of a gay Ojibwe man to accept a Native tradition where he rarely felt at home, while escaping a reservation he could never quite leave. It is told through the eyes of a twenty-something narrator, who bears a striking resemblance to Staples himself.
April 14, 2020 - MPR News Presents airs “Under a Watchful Eye,” an APM Reports & The Hechinger Report documentary that looks at colleges using big data to track students in an effort to boost graduation rates, but it comes at a cost.
July 14, 2020 - MPR’s Dan Kraker interviews John Staine, a real estate appraiser at St. Louis County courthouse, who in an effort to address racial bias in the workplace, started a direct dialog about race with his fellow 2,000 St. Louis County employees.