August 16, 2019 - In the early 2000s, Hmong Americans from Minneapolis and St. Paul flocked to Walnut Grove in southwestern Minnesota. The city is best known for its hero, Laura Ingalls Wilder, who wrote about life in the town. The Hmong immigrants were drawn to farmland, jobs at local factories, and the slower pace of life. That influx of newcomers helped keep Walnut Grove’s main drag alive. But a generation in, the Hmong Americans who came to the region are facing a challenge familiar to other rural Americans…How do you give young people a reason to stay?
August 26, 2019 - An MPR News Presents broadcast of the APM Reports education documentary “Students on the Move - Keeping uprooted kids in school.” A frank portrayal of the educational challenges facing kids whose housing is unstable by introducing listeners to kids experiencing homelessness, kids in migrant farmworker families, and some of the people trying to help them stay in school.
August 28, 2019 - An MPR News Presents broadcast of the APM Reports education documentary “At a Loss for Words - What's wrong with how schools teach reading.” A look at how a flawed idea is teaching millions of kids to be poor readers.
September 30, 2019 - MPR’s Catharine Richert reports on unlicensed midwifery in Minnesota. Segment includes history behind the legality in state, as well as perspectives from a patient, midwife, politician, lawyer, and medical professional.
October 1, 2019 - MPR’s Catharine Richert profiles Rebekah Knapp, a midwife in western Minnesota. Knapp describes aspects of her profession, including her spiritual viewpoint and working with Amish cultures.
October 7, 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 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.