Now Playing

Loading streams...

Podcasts & RSS Feeds

All Things ConsideredRSS
All ContentRSS
View all podcasts & RSS feeds

All Things Considered

Weekdays at 4PM
Robert Siegel and Melissa Block
Jill Roberts and Janie Gould

Local Programming:
 

6:00 pm: Excursions in Geography with Jim Lett

6:02 pm: Community Focus (M-TH)

6:02 pm - Floridays (F)

 

 

Genre: 
News/Talk
Composer ID: 
5187f667e1c8ba0921b28418|5187f660e1c8ba0921b28404

Pages

Politics
5:33 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

Arizona Immigration Activists Mobilize Latino Vote

Credit Andrea Hsu / NPR
Maxima Guerrero and Daniel Rodriguez canvass for votes in Phoenix. Rodriguez moved to the U.S. with his mother when he was a child, and is undocumented. "The best thing I can do now," he says, "is organize those that can [vote], and make them vote for me."
Share
E-mail
Comments
By

Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 6:21 pm

For years, Maricopa County, Ariz., has been ground zero in the debate over immigration.

On one hand, the massive county, which includes the state capital of Phoenix, has a growing Latino population. On the other, it's home to publicity savvy Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who has made his name by strictly enforcing, some say overstepping, immigration laws.

Read more
Poverty In America: The Struggle To Get Ahead
5:15 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

To Beat Odds, Poor Single Moms Need Wide Safety Net

Next imagePrevious image
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Shyanne (left) holds 1-year-old Makai, as Stepp checks to see if all of Shyanne's homework has been completed.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Along with raising three kids, Stepp works full time and takes evening classes at a local community college to earn an associate degree in early childhood education. Opportunity House also helps pay the rent on her family's apartment.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Stepp hugs her daughter, Shyanne, at the Second Street Learning Center, where she is a head assistant teacher earning less than $9 an hour. The center provides 24-hour day care for Reading's working poor and is run by a nonprofit called the Opportunity House.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Opportunity House also supports Stepp's education and sometimes will subsidize her schooling expenses if she is running short on cash. "Being a head assistant, I can't go any further without some kind of degree," she says.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Stepp sports a tattoo of her younger son's name, Makai, on her wrist. I-LEAD, the nonprofit that runs her evening classes, provides dinner for its students.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Stepp says her goal is to obtain an associate degree and then a bachelor's degree. She hopes to open a day care center of her own someday.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Stepp picks up her three children, (from left) Shyanne, 8; Isaiah, 10; and Makai, 1, at the 24-hour day care center after her classes are over around 9 p.m.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Sometimes Stepp has to remind her children why their lives are so hectic. "I explain to them that I'm doing it for them, not for me," she says.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Shyanne (left) holds 1-year-old Makai, as Stepp checks to see if all of Shyanne's homework has been completed.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Stepp speaks to Isaiah before bedtime. "Sometimes I think I have done something wrong for them to turn their backs to me," she says of her failed relationships with her children's fathers. "But then there are other times that I'm in a good mood and think, 'Oh, well. Let them go. If they don't want to do it, I can do it. I can be the mother and father at the same time.' "
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
"I think a lot of single mothers have a bad name," Stepp says. "[People] think they just go out and have babies and be on welfare. I'm the opposite, and I know [there are] other single mothers out there that are also the opposite. They try hard, and sometimes it's just not hard enough. You need that help."
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Jennifer Stepp, 29, lives in Reading, Pa., and is raising three children by herself. Like 14 million other single mothers in America, she lives below the poverty line.
Credit Kainaz Amaria / NPR
Once a thriving railroad hub and factory town in southeast Pennsylvania, Reading has a poverty rate of 41.3 percent and is labeled America's poorest city with a population of 65,000 or more.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By

Originally published on Fri July 13, 2012 6:51 pm

Single mothers have an especially hard time getting out of poverty. Households headed by single mothers are four times as likely to be poor as are families headed by married couples.

Still, many of these women are trying to get ahead. Some know instinctively what the studies show: Children who grow up in poor families are far more likely to become poor adults.

Read more
Music Interviews
5:15 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

At 100, Woody Guthrie Still Resonates

Next imagePrevious image
Credit Al Aumuller / Courtesy of the Woody Guthrie Archives
July 14, 2012, is the 100th anniversary of Woody Guthrie's birth.
Credit Twangbox Productions
Reporter Bradley Klein stands with Nora Guthrie (left), director of the Woody Guthrie Foundation, and archivist Tiffany Colannino (right).
Credit Courtesy of the Woody Guthrie Archives
One of Woody Guthrie's notebooks, circa 1942.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By editor

Originally published on Fri July 13, 2012 11:16 am

Woody Guthrie would have been 100 years old on Saturday. The singer and songwriter wrote "This Land Is Your Land," among thousands of other songs.

Even though Guthrie died almost 45 years ago, his lyrics and message continue to appeal to new generations of Americans.

Read more
Shots - Health Blog
4:31 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

Gene Mutation Offers Clue For Drugs To Stave Off Alzheimer's

Credit U.S. National Institute on Aging / via Wikimedia Commons
A PET scan of the brain of a person with Alzheimer's disease.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By

Originally published on Thu July 12, 2012 5:03 pm

Finally, there's some good news about Alzheimer's disease.

It turns out that a few lucky people carry a genetic mutation that greatly reduces their risk of getting the disease, an Icelandic team reports in the journal Nature.

The mutation also seems to protect people who don't have Alzheimer's disease from the cognitive decline that typically occurs with age.

Read more
American Dreams: Then And Now
4:18 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

Korean Families Chase Their Dreams In The U.S.

Credit Martin Kaste / NPR
Hyungsoo Kim brought his sons Woosuk (left) and Whoohyun to California from Korea so the boys could get an American public-school education. In "goose families," one parent migrates to an English-speaking country with the children, while the other parent stays in Korea.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By

Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 5:33 pm

Eleven-year-old Woosuk Kim sees his mother only three or four times a year. That's because he's part of what Koreans call a "goose family": a family that migrates in search of English-language schooling.

A goose family, Woosuk explains, means "parents — mom and dad — have to be separate for the kids' education."

Woosuk's father brought him and his little brother to America two years ago to attend Hancock Park Elementary, a public school in Los Angeles. The boys' mother stayed in South Korea to keep working.

Read more
Music Reviews
4:06 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

Sory Kandia Kouyaté: Guinea's Voice Of Revolution

Next imagePrevious image
Credit Courtesy of the artist
Released last month, La Voix de la Révolution is a new compilation of songs by Sory Kandia Kouyaté, who died in 1977.
Credit
cover art for La Voix de la Révolution
Share
E-mail
Comments
By editor

Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 5:33 pm

Sory Kandia Kouyaté was one of the most celebrated singers in West Africa when he died suddenly in 1977. He was just 44, and given his spectacular voice, it's a safe bet that Kouyaté would have been an international star had he lived just a few years longer. Now, some of his finest recordings have been collected on a two-disc retrospective called La Voix de la Révolution.

Read more
Shots - Health Blog
3:55 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

Firefighters Prevail In Fight for Health Insurance

Share
E-mail
Comments
By editor

Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 5:33 pm

It all started around a kitchen table in Custer, South Dakota. John Lauer, a 27-year-old seasonal firefighter for an elite U.S.

Read more
Europe
2:07 pm
Wed July 11, 2012

In France, The (Abandoned) Dog Days Of Summer

Next imagePrevious image
Credit Joel Saget / AFP/Getty Images
Dogs wait to be adopted at the Animals Without Home shelter south of Paris in Montgeron, France, in August 2010. France is among the European countries with the highest number of abandoned pets during the summer months, when people take long vacations.
Credit Joel Saget / AFP/Getty Images
A volunteer takes an abandoned dog for a walk at the Animals Without Home shelter in 2010.
Credit Eleanor Beardsley / NPR
Claire Brissard runs an SPCA shelter outside Paris. She says too many French equate a pet with a stuffed animal — to be thrown away when they get tired of it.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By

Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 5:33 pm

For Europeans, it's not uncommon to take a whole month of vacation in the summer. But the season can be a deadly time for the many pets left behind — permanently.

The abandonment of domestic animals by vacationers is a scourge in many countries across Europe. And in France, this summer isn't likely to be different despite campaigns by animal-rights groups against the practice.

Read more
The Two-Way
8:32 am
Wed July 11, 2012

Holy Cow! Family Finds Baseball Card Collection That May Fetch $3 Million

Credit Heritage Auctions
Two of the most valuable cards in the collection: Ty Cobb (left) and Honus "Hans" Wagner.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By

Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 5:33 pm

"My grandfather stuck it in the attic a hundred years ago and here it is now, a blessing to his grandchildren."

A blessing for sure.

As the Toledo Blade reports, when Karl Kissner and his cousins were clearing out his grandfather's home in Defiance, Ohio, on Feb. 29 they came across a box of very rare and very valuable baseball cards.

Read more
Around the Nation
5:25 pm
Tue July 10, 2012

Homeless Rural Vets Find A Place To Call Home

Credit Lucy Nalpathanchil for NPR
American Legion Post Cmdr. Mark Czmyr and his father, Navy veteran William Czmyr, originated the idea to create permanent apartments for homeless vets in Jewett City, Conn.
Share
E-mail
Comments
By editor

Originally published on Tue July 10, 2012 7:34 pm

This month, more than a dozen homeless veterans will finally have a place to call their own, thanks to the American Legion.

The organization's post in a small Connecticut town has been working for a decade on a unique project to create not transitional but permanent supportive housing in their rural community.

For 55-year-old Army veteran Jeff MacDonald, the new facility in Jewett City, Conn., was like "winning the lottery."

Read more

Pages