Jeffrey Pierre

Tiwa Savage was already turning heads with her music — a deft fusion of Afrobeat with pop, R&B and hip-hop sounds — for years when she was handpicked by Beyoncé to appear on The Gift, the soundtrack album for the 2019 remake of The Lion King. Now, the Nigerian artist has returned with her third studio album and American debut, Celia. She spoke about the record's themes and featured collaborations with All Things Considered; hear the radio version at the audio link, and read on for an edited transcript.

Singer Danielle Ponder knows that empathy is a powerful tool in songwriting. "I think in music, you're telling a story," she tells NPR's Weekend Edition, "and a good songwriter is telling a story in a way where the audience empathizes or can see themselves in that person's shoes."

It's really not that different, the Rochester, N.Y.-based musician says, from being a defense attorney. She should know; outside of her music career, Ponder also spent five years as a public defender.

Peaceful, student-led protests have been a powerful force for change throughout American history.

In 1925, for example, students at Fisk University staged a 10-week protest to speak out against the school's president, who didn't want students starting a chapter of the N.A.A.C.P. In 1940, almost 2,000 students protested after New York University decided to pull a black player from its football roster to accommodate the University of Missouri's segregationists.

And campus-based protests, including against racism, were a major lever of social change in the 1960s.

The police killings of George Floyd in Minneapolis and Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Ky., have sparked a national conversation around racial justice.

In a world where more educators are turning to project-based learning, some students may now have the option to submit a podcast instead of a traditional assignment — like a research paper. But just how exactly do you grade a podcast? How do you gauge its success?

NPR's Education Team wants to hear from educators who are using podcasts in their lesson plans. We want to know what's working and what isn't? How well are students performing in these assignments?

On the wind-whipped hills north of Haiti's capital, Port-au-Prince, Berthenid Dasny holds the keys to the gated memorial erected for Haiti's earthquake victims. Thousands of bodies are buried here in a mass grave dug after a magnitude 7 earthquake shook the country on Jan. 12, 2010.

"They've forgotten about this place; it should look better than this," Dasny says as she walks past the overgrown grass, rusted metal statues and brittle brush. For the past year, she has been the memorial's groundskeeper, though she has never been paid.

This year's high school graduates were born after the dawn of the new millennium. Some have dealt with school shootings. Others helped organize demonstrations to speak out against gun violence or climate change. We've reported on how college students are becoming more "nontraditional" than we think, but high school students — through social media and their experience — are also becoming more nontraditional.

You're reading NPR's weekly roundup of education news.

Report: K-12 school funding up in states that had teacher protests

A report released Wednesday by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities says K-12 school funding is up in four states where significant teacher strikes or protests occurred in 2018.

You're reading NPR's weekly roundup of education news.

Looking back at week one of the LA teacher strike

The school district and union leaders returned to the negotiation table on Thursday, and with talks scheduled throughout the weekend, some are trying to see an end to this week-long teacher strike.

Updated Saturday at 1:14 p.m. ET.

You're reading NPR's weekly roundup of education news.

'On Monday we will be ready to strike'

Los Angeles is bracing for a teacher strike, which could affect roughly 480,000 public school students.

On one side is the LA Unified School District; on the other, United Teachers Los Angeles, a union of more than 30,000 members who have been working without a contract for over a year.

You're reading NPR's weekly roundup of education news.

New guidelines for campus sexual assault enforcement are open for public comment

In an election that's largely not about education — polls and NPR's reporting says immigration and healthcare are two top issues — we wanted to focus on the places where education is influencing and mobilizing voters.

Here are our nine takeaways of what to watch:

1. Teachers are flexing their (political) muscles

With just days to go, both of the major teachers' unions have devoted their considerable resources to the election.

You're reading NPR's weekly roundup of education news.

New school shooting database shows 2018 spike

A new database released this week finds that 2018 was a record year for school violence.

The researchers cross-referenced more than 1,300 incident reports from 25 different sources going back nearly 50 years. This K-12 school shooting database tried to capture each and every instance a gun was brandished or a bullet was fired on school property.