What Could Go Right: Whatever Happened to Civics?

Civics 101

NHPR

Society & Culture, Government, History

4.6 • 2.4K Ratings

🗓️ 14 October 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Today we’re bringing you an episode of What Could Go Right from our friends at The Progress Network. Each Wednesday on What Could Go Right, hosts Zachary Karabell and Emma Varvaloucas converse with diverse experts to have sharp, honest conversations about what’s going on in the world, even during difficult times. In this episode, Nick spoke with Emma and Zachary about the state of civics education in the US, as well as how we can start to talk to each other civilly in an increasingly polarized political landscape. You can listen to What Could Go Right here or, as they say, wherever you get your everything. CLICK HERE: Visit our website to see all of our episodes, donate to the podcast, sign up for our newsletter, get free educational materials, and more! To see Civics 101 in book form, check out A User's Guide to Democracy: How America Works by Hannah McCarthy and Nick Capodice, featuring illustrations by Tom Toro. Check out our other weekly NHPR podcast, Outside/In - we think you'll love it! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello everyone, Nick here.
0:02.9	It's a rainy Monday. It's holiday.
0:06.1	I'm doing one of those things where I'm recording, not in a studio, but just because I like the sound of the rain.
0:11.6	You really need it this year.
0:14.0	I wanted to take the opportunity this week to share a podcast with you, a wonderful podcast
0:19.3	that I had the distinct honor and pleasure to be on, called What Could Go Right.
0:25.5	This is a fantastic show from her friends at the Progress Network.
0:28.7	Their show description says, each Wednesday on What Could Go Right, hosts Zachary Carabelle and Emma Varvalucas,
0:35.8	converse with diverse experts to have sharp, honest
0:38.5	conversations about what's going on in the world, even during difficult times.
0:43.9	Since I was the guest this week, I will admit it was honest.
0:47.0	I'll leave the sharp up to you.
0:49.1	And as for what we talked about, we talked about civics education,
0:53.0	and we talked about how to have conversations with people
0:55.8	with whom we might disagree, which is quite honestly more important now than any time in my memory.
1:03.5	Anyways, hope you enjoy it. It was a delight to talk with Zachary and Emma, and I hope you check
1:09.3	them out. All right, have a good week.
1:11.1	Civil or not.
1:12.0	We'll be back with you soon.
1:14.4	What Could Go Right?
1:16.2	I'm Zachary Carabelle, the founder of the Progress Network, joined as always by Emma Varvaluccas,
1:21.7	the executive director of the Progress Network.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from NHPR, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of NHPR and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.