Shows
Why Don’t We Know PodcastWe actually won a FERPA appealWe close out Why Don't We Know with a huge victory - a win against the abuse of FERPA, the federal privacy law that often leads to harmful secrets in schools. In this episode, we beat FERPA to get a video of an encounter between a school police officer and a student in Jeannette, Pennsylvania.
2024-06-1426 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastThe unintended consequence of police in schoolsThe complicated and misunderstood history of having police officers in schools, and one group of students first-hand stories of what it means to have them in their hallways.
2024-06-1338 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWhy do children end up in juvy?In our final drop of episodes for Why Don’t We Know, we explore the secrecy of the juvenile justice system, starting with how kids are often punished with fees and fines.
More than 30 states allow kids to be fined while in the juvenile system, and it’s very difficult to figure out how many children are affected because there is such poor data.
2024-06-1245 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWhistleblowerWhat happens when a police officer breaks the silent code and speaks out about misconduct? This is the story of Cariol Horne, a former Buffalo cop who tried to do the right thing and is paying the price.
2023-02-1732 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWhy Is Data Collection So Darn Difficult?In May of 2015, shortly after the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown by a Ferguson, Missouri police officer, former President Barack Obama traveled to Camden, New Jersey to announce a new program that was supposed to help repair the broken relationship between police and communities of color. This Police Data Initiative was to take poorly kept data and make it better, more uniform, and more accessible to the general public. The notion was that better data on policing would ultimately improve transparency and accountability between police and citizens. But today, if you visit the website for the police data in...
2023-01-2740 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWho Are Body Cameras Really For?After the nationwide protests following George Floyd’s death, we did a little experiment to see if we could get body worn camera footage from officers at the scene of protests where we knew there were injuries.
Host: Sara Ganim. Reporters: Kristin Moorehead, Thomas Holton. Guests: Mary D. Fan, Dan Adams, Sarah Jensen, Patrick Michaud, Lauren Bonds, Gideon Oliver.
Editors: Amy Fu, James Sullivan. Original score: Pete Readman. Research: Brittany Suzsan. Produced by The Brechner Center for Freedom of Information at The University of Florida.
2023-01-2034 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWelcome to Season 2 - The Criminal Justice SystemSeason 2 of Why Don’t We Know starts here, with a preview of our season about secrecy in the criminal justice system. Host Sara Ganim starts by explaining why we are here and how we found our reporting.
Host: Sara Ganim. Editors: Amy Fu, James Sullivan. Original score: Pete Readman. Research: Audrey Mostek, Brittany Suszan Produced by The Brechner Center for Freedom of Information at The University of Florida.
2023-01-1310 minWhy Don’t We Know Podcast”Police Say”In the moments after 21-year-old Kevin Peterson Jr. was killed, Clark County Sheriff Chuck Atkins took to a podium to defend his deputies.
Although he started with a warning, “I am waiting along with you to learn about much of the details,” Atkins speculated about something significant that would soon become very clearly incorrect: “The man reportedly fired his weapon at the deputies.”
Police reform advocates describe this as an assassination followed by a character assassination and an analysis of 14 cases - some high profile and some not - shows that distorted narratives that make the dead...
2023-01-1349 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastSpecial Episode: Jason Leopold - Ultimate TransparencyIn this special episode, we bring you a live taping of the first-ever Brechner Speaker Series, co-hosted by the Brechner Center for Freedom of Information and the Bob Graham Center for Public Service, featuring award-winning investigative reporter Jason Leopold, who has broken some of the top stories of our time using the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA.) Nicknamed "the FOIA terrorist" by government officials who are forced to answer his requests, Jason talks about ultimate transparency in government and in his own personal life.
He is the reporter who forced Hillary Clinton's emails to become public, exposed a...
2022-10-261h 03
Talkin‘ Politics & Religion Without Killin‘ Each OtherDanny Cevallos, legal analyst for NBC on Dobbs, the Jan. 6th Hearings, deputizing the Texas citizenry, W. Va. vs. EPA and more!Danny Cevallos is a legal analyst for NBC and MSNBC and co-founder of the law firm Cevallos & Wong, LLP. He focuses his practice in the areas of state, federal, and territorial criminal defense and civil litigation. Danny also handles wrongful conviction and malicious prosecution cases; he has handled a number of high profile cases in the federal, state, and territorial courts, ranging from white collar criminal matters to first-degree murder cases; and you may have previously seen him as a Legal Analyst at CNN, HLN and TruTV and as a regular on shows such as Erin Burnett OutFront and...
2022-08-021h 18Talkin‘ Politics & Religion Without Killin‘ Each OtherDanny Cevallos, legal analyst for NBC on Dobbs, the Jan. 6th Hearings, deputizing the Texas citizenry, W. Va. vs. EPA and more!Danny Cevallos is a legal analyst for NBC and MSNBC and co-founder of the law firm Cevallos & Wong, LLP. He focuses his practice in the areas of state, federal, and territorial criminal defense and civil litigation. Danny also handles wrongful conviction and malicious prosecution cases; he has handled a number of high profile cases in the federal, state, and territorial courts, ranging from white collar criminal matters to first-degree murder cases; and you may have previously seen him as a Legal Analyst at CNN, HLN and TruTV and as a regular on shows such as Erin Burnett OutFront and...
2022-08-021h 18Why Don’t We Know PodcastSpecial Episode: ’Gag order’ against sexual assaultIn this special episode, taped live at SXSW EDU in Austin, Texas in March, we discuss how schools are bullying young sexual assault accusers into waiving their rights during school investigations into what happened to them. Title IX is supposed to protect students who allege sexual assault, but some schools are requiring their silence, and threatening discipline if they don't comply.
It runs afoul of the law, many experts say, and led attorney Laura Dunn and the non-profit Equal Rights Advocates to pen a letter to the U.S. Department of Education, trying to get the Biden...
2022-06-0246 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastEXTRA: Why don't we know where all the lead pipes are?In April, President Joe Biden announced an infrastructure plan that includes removing and replacing all of America's lead drinking water pipes. It's an ambitious plan that would help millions of American children, and it was met with a lot of praise. But we couldn't help but wonder if this plan sounded too easy. Because as we've seen on a much smaller scale, sometimes it's really hard to know where all the lead pipes are. Host: Sara Ganim. Guests: Erik Olsen, Alex Stubblefield.
2021-06-0314 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastEXTRA: The Human Toll Of Missing DataDepending on where you look, you can find a statistic that will tell you any number you want to see about how often students are bullied in school. Why is that? Why are bullying numbers all over the place? And how does it cause students to fall through the cracks? Host: Gabriella Paul. Reporter: McKenna Beery. Guests: Itea Aslanian, Deborah Temkin, Brooke Greier.
2021-04-0118 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastAny Other LawIn the season one finale of, we're unpacking a season full of secrecy in public education - answering the final 'WHY' of Why Don't We Know -- which is why hasn't FERPA been fixed? Host: Sara Ganim. Reporter: Conner Mitchell. Guests: Frank LoMonte, Paige Kowalski.
2021-02-2348 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastEXTRA: Why Don't We Know how many kids are attending virtual learning?This was the most disruptive academic year in modern history, and we have collected very little data to help our students recover from it. This Extra episode tackles the question of Why Don't We Know how many students are actually attending virtual learning and which ones fell behind. Host: Sara Ganim. Reporter: Gabriella Paul. Guest: Paige Kowalski.
2021-01-2712 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastEXTRA: AttackedWhen it comes to physical attacks on teachers in the classroom, it appears, we don't want to know. This episode explores the missing data regarding violence in the classroom and how it affects a school district. Host: Sara Ganim. Reporter: Angela DiMichele. Guests: Bill Gillard, anonymous teacher.
2021-01-2020 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastMisplaced FearWe assumed that, since school shootings are such a known public safety concern, there would be really detailed data on how many weapons are brought into K-12 schools. But 15 states stopped us from seeing the mere number of guns brought to schools out of fear of violating privacy.
2021-01-1331 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWhat the heck is FERPA?A step back and a look at the history of FERPA, the privacy act we’ve now spent quite a bit of time dissecting. How did we get here? We start in 1974 at its infancy and then look at two cases at the same university that show the glaring hypocrisy of its current use. Host: Sara Ganim; Reporter: Camille Respess; Guests: Amelia Vance, James Buckley, Lee Hermiston and Clark Kauffman
2020-11-3041 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastEducation RecordsFrom sexual assault, to school yard injuries, to public safety, to political campaign contributions to racial bias, a federal privacy law called FERPA is being used as a one-word, catch-all answer for any information a school doesn't want to share. Host: Sara Ganim; Reporters: Marianna Faiello, Camille Respess; Guests: Laura Dunn, Karen Truszkowski, Brett Sokolow, Kendall Ware, Samantha Brennan, Abigail Owens, Brooke Moore.
2020-11-1650 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastSecret OutcomesWhy Don't We Know how Title IX cases are handled at many universities? The answer is combination of two things: a real concern for privacy and the comfort of secrecy. Host: Sara Ganim. Reporter: Marianna Faiello. Guests: Liz Abdnour, Brett Sokolow.
2020-10-2844 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastBONUS: Secrecy and the Coronavirus
Government agencies everywhere, not just schools, are using COVID19 as an excuse for not sharing information. FOIA office phone lines were disconnected. Calls went unreturned. Emails unanswered.
In this episode, we also explore how government agencies are misapplying the Health Insurance and Portability Act. You probably know it as HIPAA.
Guests: Dave Cuillier, Terry Mutchler, Al-Amyn Sumar, Carolyne Hartley.
2020-10-1923 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastUp In FlamesOff-campus housing is often the only choice for certain students attending college, but finding safe housing can be a real challenge. In addition, we discuss how private partnerships are leading to some major financial failures for public universities building new dorms. Host: Sara Ganim. Guests: Janet Maupin, , Bob Fitzsimons, Jessica Wood. Reporters: Brittney Miller, Tori Whidden.
2020-10-1240 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastPublic, Not PublicIt's estimated that 75 percent of public universities use non-profit foundations to do certain work in secret that would otherwise be done in public. Raising money from influential donors is one of the most common. Host: Sara Ganim. Guests: Alexa Capeloto, Miranda Spivack, Evan Johns.
2020-09-2130 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastThe PortalIt's designed to be hidden. Public universities are turning to private portals to shield information that otherwise would be part of the public record. Host: Sara Ganim. Reporter: Camille Respess. Guest: Paula Lavigne, Judith Wilde, Jim Finklestein.
2020-09-1433 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastEXTRA: When speech isn’t free, but it should beUnconstitutional speech policies aren't just for college athletes. In the midst of a global pandemic, we found that resident assistants are also told they can't speak to the media without first getting permission.
2020-09-0709 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWhat is a FOIA Anyway?The ability to request records from public institutions is part of the law, and in theory, should take a few weeks, at best. But after nine months, when several universities hadn’t responded to some requests at all, we started calling to see what was going on. Host: Sara Ganim. Guests: Terry Mutchler, Dave Cuillier, Matt Reed.
2020-08-3133 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastThe Blame GameWhy Don’t We Know how to stop hazing deaths? It’s one of those sadly persistent stories, with no real progress being made toward a solution. Host: Sara Ganim. Reporter: Jessica Curbelo. Guests: Daphne Beletsis, Doug Fierberg, Walter Kimbrough, David Easlick.
2020-08-2454 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastA Deadly ReversalThere’s a hidden and deadly danger inside many public university buildings, but no one is talking about it, no one is regulating it, and it’s nearly impossible to find on your own. Host Sara Ganim interviews attorney Mike Robb about a case of a deadly reversal. Other guests: Erik Olson, Barry Castleman, Linda Reinstein.
2020-08-1733 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastMore Than Just a Code of SilenceOur research found that many major public universities have policies that silence athletes, robbing them of their first amendment rights. The policies are not only restrictive, they’re unconstitutional. Host Sara Ganim talks to Ramogi Huma, president of the National College Players Association, about the impact of this bad policy, and why no one has challenged it.
2020-08-1044 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastInvisible InjuryEver since Junior Seau propelled the horrors of chronic traumatic encephalopathy into the general public, we’ve repeatedly heard a singular narrative from those in charge of the sport of football: The sport is safer than ever.
But how do we know that?
At the college level, we’ve never seen those raw numbers. And so Season 1 of Why Don’t We Know set out to find the answer. Are there really fewer concussions than there were a decade years ago?
We asked 100 public universities across the country for their aggregate numbers — broken down by spo...
2020-08-1041 minWhy Don’t We Know PodcastWhy Don't We KnowWe expect government secrecy from the Pentagon or the CIA — not from our universities and our schools.
But in many cases, institutions designed to protect our children are instead hiding critical information.
It leaves us asking a lot of questions. One of which is simple…why don’t we know?
Over the following episodes, we are trying to figure that out.
2020-08-0507 min