David Fleischer is the Director of the Los Angeles LGBT Center’s Leadership Lab. Through their work in talking to thousands of voters, the Center created “deep canvassing,” a method of exchanging narratives to find common ground and decrease prejudice. We discuss how changing minds begins with the heart.

Thomas Abt is a Senior Fellow at the Council on Criminal Justice, and author of Bleeding Out, The Devastating Consequences of Urban Violence--and a Bold New Plan for Peace in the Streets. We talk about why violence must be tackled first, how it is the lynchpin of concentrated urban poverty, and what effective violence reduction strategies should look like.

Michael Baranowski is the founder and one of the hosts on the popular podcast The Politics Guys. The podcast is a place for bipartisan, rational, and civil debate on American politics and policy. We discuss why civil dialogue is critical in a democracy, the value of keeping an open mind, and the relative strength of our institutions and electoral system.

Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice host Civics 101, the podcast refresher course about the basics of how American democracy works. We discuss the importance of empowering citizens and understanding the rules of our complex system, as well as the enduring repercussions of slavery in the United States.

Louise Dubé is the Executive Director of iCivics, an organization whose mission is to cultivate a new generation of students for thoughtful and active citizenship. We discuss the critical importance of high-quality civics education, the role of iCivics games in effective learning, and the necessity for robust investment and legislation in this space.

Ezra Levin is the Co-Executive Director of Indivisible, whose mission is to cultivate a progressive grassroots movement. We discuss the urgency of democracy reform, structural issues that relate to our nation’s history, and how we can achieve a democracy that truly reflects the will of the people.

Matthew Jones is a historian of science and technology at Columbia University. We examine the moral and ethical elements of big data, the big business of the surveillance of our personal information online, and how we can demand solutions that reflect our collective values.

Jonathan Lamontagne is a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Tufts University School of Engineering. In his recent study, he finds that immediate global action is required for robust climate abatement. We discuss the narrow window that still remains for both a tolerable climate future and tolerable economic conditions.

Liz Willen is the Editor in Chief of the Hechinger Report, an independent, nonprofit, and award-winning newsroom that covers inequality and innovation in education. We discuss who is attending and completing college, who is not, and why higher education must be more widely accessible to all Americans.

James Knickman is a health economist and the Director of the Health Evaluation and Analytics Lab, a joint initiative on health policy and population health at NYU. We discuss the necessary components that contribute to better health outcomes in populations and how we can achieve them going forward.

Robing Steinberg is the founder and CEO of The Bail Project, an unprecedented national effort to combat mass incarceration by transforming the pretrial system in the US. We discuss how cash bail has been used to incarcerate millions of innocent people, what the collateral cost of this system is to our society, and how we should reconceive it.

Lynn Paltrow is the Founder and Executive Director of National Advocates for Pregnant Women. We take a deep dive into the consequences of recognizing fetal personhood for the human rights of women and how reproductive health is at the center of the fight for equal rights.

Melissa Mark-Viverito is the former Speaker of the New York City Council and co-founder of the 21 in ’21 Initiative. She argues that electing women into government is critical for our society and democracy because their perspectives and experiences need to be represented in budgets, public policy, and legislation.

Alan Yarborough is the communications coordinator in the Office of Government Relations of the Episcopal Church in Washington. Bill Steverson is a parishioner of the church in Tennessee. We discuss the power of civil discourse to engage despite disagreements, and finding common value with respect and humility to allow for a sacred space for debate.

Ben Theodore is an avid community activist in Brooklyn, as well as a program associate at the NYC Department of Education. His passion for civic engagement shows how it can transform our society. We discuss the power of local politics and grassroots activism, our responsibility as citizens, and the importance of idealism in public policy and politics.

Esther de Rothschild is the founder of The Love Vote, a platform where people who cannot vote, mobilize those who can. Together with Outreach Director Aicha Cherif, we discuss how love can be a strong motivator for voting. Eligible voters are moved to vote on behalf of their loved ones and give collective action a powerful boost.