11 MAY 2024 · On this episode, Andrew and Beth speak with Kim Russell, an activist for preserving girls’ and women’s sports. Russell shares her story about what attracted her to take the position of the Women’s Lacrosse Coach at Oberlin College, a notoriously left-leaning college and how a social media post on trans swimmer Lia Thomas led to her removal from that position. She talks about the culture of fear on campus on speaking out about protecting the sanctity of women’s sports. Russell also talks about how the feminist movement has been turned on its head, as well as the epidemic of anxiety, mental illness and depression amongst college age young women.   Since being removed from het position in September of 2023, Russell has been spending most of her time traveling around the country advocating for girls and women in sport and the Women’s Bill of Rights with the https://www.iwf.org/2023/10/30/coach-kim-russell-joins-independent-womens-forum-as-an-ambassador/.   She testified in front of Congress about the importance of Title IX in December and most recently was part of a Title IX Senate Roundtable. She is on the Board of the https://usvila.org and is their Director of National Teams and 1st ever Women’s Lacrosse Head Coach.

27 APR 2024 · Andrew and Beth speak with education activist https://twitter.com/esanzi about the Biden administration’s recently released new Title IX Rules. Sanzi gives us a brief overview of the history of the legislation and illustrates how the rules changed dramatically under the Obama administration and then the Trump administration. And now Biden’s new rules bring back kangaroo courts and eliminate due process on college campuses for students accused of sexual harassment. She also talks about how the new rules compel speech and likely violate the First Amendment. Sanzi also explains how the rules make gender a protected class which will inevitably lead to the destruction of girls’ and women’s sports.  Finally, we discuss what her organization, https://defendinged.org, is doing to combat Biden’s new rules, and shares her view on why Congress has been absent in this fight. Erika Sanzi is the Director of Outreach at Parents Defending Education. She is a former educator and elected school board member and currently serves on the board of advisors for https://boysinitiative.org. She is the mother of three teenage sons.

14 APR 2024 · Beth and Andrew speak with researcher https://twitter.com/_CryMiaRiver, author of the https://environmentalprogress.org/big-news/wpath-files that exposed the insanity of transgender medicine worldwide. Hughes gives us an overview of the organization, World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) and explains why they became so influential globally on transgender issues. She discusses some of the key findings of her report including the lack of informed consent, and the immense damage caused to children by cross-sex hormones and body mutilating surgeries. Mia Hughes is an Ottawa-based British journalist and researcher for Michael Shellenberger's nonprofit Environmental Progress. Hughes has three children and before becoming a journalist she was a stay-at-home mother.

30 MAR 2024 · Beth and Andrew speak with parent activist Alexandra Frank, who shares her own story about what led her to become an "accidental activist," having experienced the ideological capture of her twin daughters’ private school in Pennsylvania and then experiencing the same thing at their new public school in Massachusetts. She talks about the inappropriate sexual material being taught to elementary school aged children, about segregating affinity groups, and the influence of radical gender ideology. Frank also discusses how schools’ focus on leftist ideology has led to the deterioration of traditional academics. Alexandra Frank grew up in Colorado Springs, Colorado, graduated from Colgate University with a major in biochemistry and North Carolina State College of Veterinary Medicine with her veterinary degree after which she completed a rotating internship in small animal medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. She has worked in various roles as a clinician in the veterinary medical field in Delaware, Pennsylvania and currently, Massachusetts. She is mother to 11 year old fraternal twin girls and is the creator of the website http://www.dsfactsandresources.com/ about the Dover Sherborn school district in Massachusetts.

17 MAR 2024 · On this episode, Beth and Andrew speak with author Coleman Hughes about his new book, https://www.amazon.com/End-Race-Politics-Arguments-Colorblind/dp/0593332458. Hughes talks about race was never an issue growing up and then first experiencing the divisive obsession with race politics as a student at Columbia University. We discuss how the civil rights movement’s dream of colorblindness turned into today’s leftist belief in neoracism and DEI. Hughes also explains how the academic studies behind the idea of implicit bias are bunk. Coleman Cruz Hughes is a writer and host of the popular "Conversations with Coleman" podcast. He was a fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research and is a https://www.thefp.com/t/coleman-hughes and  a graduate of Columbia University.

2 MAR 2024 · On this episode, Andrew and Beth speak with https://www.thefp.com reporter Francesca Block. We discuss her recent reporting on the blatant antisemitism and leftist ideological capture of K-12 schools, specifically in a post October 7th world. Block talks about her articles which reports on how BLM materials are used in some New York City public schools, and how one school literally wiped Israel off the map being used to teach students. We also talk about another recent piece of hers which reports on whether we will see a political realignment of progressive Jews, and her interview with Civil Rights leader Clarence Jones, co-author of Martin Luther King Jr’s I have a Dream Speech. Block also shares what led her to a career in journalism and talks about the institutional contempt for free speech and open discourse that she experienced as a student at Princeton. Francesca Block is a reporter for The Free Press. She started her career as a breaking news reporter for the Des Moines Register, where she reported on topics ranging from crime and public safety to food insecurity and the Iowa caucus. She graduated from Princeton University in 2022.

17 FEB 2024 · On this episode Andrew and Beth speak with James Fishback, founder of https://incubatedebate.org. Fishback discusses how high school debate tournaments went woke in recent years and illustrates the National Speech and Debate Association’s extreme liberal bias. He shares stories of how judges are ideologically motivated and either won’t allow certain positions to be debated or dock points for non-leftist opinions. He also talks about his recent piece for The Free Press, entitled, “https://www.thefp.com/p/the-truth-about-banned-books” where he exposed the severe ideological asymmetries in school libraries around the country. James Fishback is the founder and executive director of Incubate Debate, a no-cost high school debate league that champions merit, civility, and open debate. Incubate Debate is the fastest-growing debate league in America, having tripled the students it serves in the past year. Fishback is a former high school debate national champion, having competed 2009-2013 at Boyd H. Anderson High School in South Florida. He studied International Economics at Georgetown University’s Walsh School of Foreign Service.

3 FEB 2024 · After a short hiatus, we are back with Take Back Our Schools. Welcome Back! On this episode, Beth and Andrew speak with the powerhouse father-son team of Shelby and Eli Steele about race relations in America. Both Shelby and Eli share their views on the recent Claudine Gay affair at Harvard University and give their opinions on whether this event marks a turning point in the fight against the diversity, equity and inclusion regime. Shelby talks about his own upbringing and his family’s experience in the Civil Rights movement and remarks upon why the Civil Rights movement went wrong. He talks about how the idea of “white guilt” plays a prominent role in today’s obsession with identity. Shelby also shares his strong views on the similarities between how victimhood is used by race hustlers in the black community and with the ongoing events in Israel and with Hamas. Eli talks about why he, as a part black, part Jewish and hearing impaired man, thoroughly rejects identity politics and victimhood. Eli also discusses the documentary he is currently making with his father, “White Guilt.” Shelby Steele is the Robert J. and Marion E. Oster Senior Fellow (adjunct) at the Hoover Institution. He specializes in the study of race relations, multiculturalism, and affirmative action. He has written widely on race in American society and the consequences of contemporary social programs on race relations. Shelby received the National Book Critic's Circle Award in 1990 in the general nonfiction category for his book The Content of Our Character: A New Vision of Race in America (HarperCollins, 1998). Other books by Steele include Shame: How America's Past Sins Have Polarized Our Country (Basic Books, 2015), A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why He Can't Win (Free Press, 2007), White Guilt: How Blacks and Whites Together Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Era (HarperCollins, 2006) and A Dream Deferred: The Second Betrayal of Black Freedom in America (HarperCollins, 1998). Shelby is also a member of the National Association of Scholars, the national board of the American Academy for Liberal Education, the University Accreditation Association, and the national board at the Center for the New American Community at the Manhattan Institute. Eli Steele is an award-winning filmmaker and “What Killed Michael Brown?” marked his first professional collaboration with his father, Shelby Steele. A graduate of Claremont McKenna College and Pepperdine University's School of Public Policy, Steele’s career highlights include “How Jack Became Black,” “What’s Bugging Seth,” winner of ten film festivals, and “Katrina,” an MTV Network pilot which won him the Breakthrough Filmmakers Award. Steele has written for publications ranging from LA Times to Commentary Magazine. https://cdn.ricochet.com/app/uploads/2024/02/Take-Back-Our-Schools-Ep-73-Men-of-Steele.pdf

16 DEC 2023 · This week Beth and Andrew speak with Maragret Busse, Executive Director of Utah’s Department of Commerce. Busse talks about Utah’s lawsuits against Tik Tok and Meta for the harms social media platforms are causing children. We discuss these harms and the algorithms that social media platforms use to hook children. She shares her views on the possible remedies of these lawsuits, and the state’s new proposed rules for social media including age verification and parental consent. We also talk about the role of parents in limiting social media use for their own kids. Margaret Woolley Busse was appointed the Executive Director of Utah’s Department of Commerce in January 2021 by Governor Spencer Cox. Under her leadership, the Department published proposed rules for age verification and parental consent in order to operationalize Utah's groundbreaking new social media law, which the department is charged with enforcing beginning March 2023. Busse holds an MBA from Harvard University, a master’s degree in Public Policy from Brigham Young University and a bachelor’s degree in both Public Policy and Economics from Brigham Young University, where she graduated cum laude and with university honors. She is a Utah native and has five children, ages 10 to 20.

2 DEC 2023 · Jamie Reed is a gay woman, a parent of five children and is married to a transgender man. So, what led her to publicly pull back the curtain on what was happening at the Pediatric Transgender Center at Washington University in St. Louis, MO and to talk of the immense harms being done to children, especially young girls? We discuss the reasons for the explosion of transgender cases we’ve seen in America over recent years, including the role of schools, social media, and healthcare economics. Reed also talks about how being a whistleblower has impacted her own life, and her current advocacy work on behalf of children. Jamie Reed is currently an organizer with the https://lgbtcouragecoalition.substack.com, working to end medical transition in children and adolescents.