Top of Mind with Julie Rose
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Top of Mind with Julie Rose
Tackling tough topics in a way that will help you feel more empathy and empower you to become a better citizen, kinder neighbor, and more effective advocate. For people who are turned off by the divisive nature of the news, but still want to engage with important issues. Hosted by journalist Julie R...
Episoade Recente
144 episoade
Wrongful Convictions: How Innocent People End Up Behind Bars
What happens when the justice system convicts an innocent person? Anthony Graves spent 18 years in prison—12 of them on Texas death row—for a crime he...
Why are Americans Having Fewer Kids?
Americans are having fewer babies than ever before. The fertility rate in the United States has dropped to an all-time low of 1.6 births per woman. In...
Too Hot to Handle? America’s Deadly Heat Problem
Extreme heat kills more Americans most years than hurricanes, floods and tornadoes combined, but we don’t give it the same emergency treatment. The go...
Does America Have a Balance of Power Problem?
How is the balance of power supposed to work when a U.S. President aggressively pushes for more? In his first 100 days of his second term, President D...
Can Free Housing Solve Homelessness? The Housing First Experiment
Is Housing First a viable solution or just repeating the past? What actually works to end homelessness? Communities across the U.S. have debated and t...
Feeling Unheard by Congress? Here's What You Need to Know.
It’s easier than ever to connect with our representatives in Congress, so why doesn’t it feel like they’re listening?
The 1st Amendment g...
Should Kids Have Smartphones in the Classroom?
Smartphones have become an essential part of daily life, but should they have a place in the classroom? Half of U.S. states have recently passed laws...
Who Counts as American? The Birthright Citizenship Debate
For over 150 years, the U.S. has granted automatic citizenship to babies born on American soil, a principle rooted in the 14th Amendment and seen by m...
Rethinking Drinking: America’s Evolving Relationship with Alcohol
Alcohol is a deeply embedded part of American life—woven into celebrations, identity, and social norms. But from health warnings to sober-curious tren...
The Unfinished Business of School Integration in America
School integration in America is widely viewed as a civil rights milestone— but decades later, U.S. schools are as segregated as they were in the 1970...
BONUS: The Credit Card Debt Conversation - A Closer Look at the Role of Credit Counseling
In this special bonus episode of Top of Mind, Julie Rose revisits the challenge of credit card debt - a topic that hits home for many of us – by sitti...
Making Sense of America’s Credit Card Debt
Credit card debt is at an all-time high in America. Half of all Americans with a credit card have carried a balance in the past year, and one in three...
ISIS and the New Threat of Radicalization in America
In 2017, the US and a coalition of more than 80 countries ran ISIS out of its strongholds, killed the group's top leaders, and declared victory.
Americans Are Reading Fewer Books Than Ever. Does That Matter in 2025?
Americans reported reading 12 books on average in 2022. That’s the lowest number since Gallup started polling on this in the 90s. Survey data from 202...
America is Rethinking Public Education. What Will the Future of School Look Like?
The current state of education in America is a troubling picture. Reading proficiency scores have reached historic lows. Chronic absenteeism is on the...
Is Marijuana Legalization Working Out Like We Thought it Would?
More Americans use cannabis every day, or almost every day, than use alcohol on a daily basis. That's in large part because marijuana is a lot more ac...
An Unlikely Friendship and the Fight to Make America Safer
They started off as ideological enemies.
Mark Rosenberg pioneered the public health approach to preventing gun violence and opened a br...
Is AI Killing Our Creativity?
It’s been about two years since the public got a taste of ChatGPT for the first time. Now, artificial intelligence has seeped into nearly every aspect...
Free Speech on Campus: Protect Students or Speech?
A 2024 Knight Foundation report found one in four college students think schools need to protect students by banning speech they may find offensive or...
How Do We Solve Loneliness in America?
In his parting prescription for the country, outgoing US Surgeon General, Doctor Vivek Murthy writes that he is worried about how exhausted and alone...
Does IQ Really Matter?
Why is insulting someone’s intelligence such a potent put down? It’s more than saying someone lacks knowledge or book learning. It’s a statement of a...
The Surprising Truth About Reconciliation After Estrangement
More than a quarter of Americans are estranged from at least one family member. Parent/child estrangement is the most common – especially between dads...
Christian or Not? Unpacking America's Religious Identity
Can America guarantee free expression of religion in public as an officially secular, but culturally Christian nation? Expressing religious faith in p...
The Pandemic Shook America's Trust in Vaccines—and Taught Us Something About Building Trust in Institutions
Trust in institutions like the media, the medical system, public schools, all branches of government, and science is at an all-time low. When it comes...
Why It's So Easy to Ignore Caregivers (Especially Moms) and How to Change That
Care work is the labor essential to life. But two-thirds of caregiving goes uncompensated. What do we miss when we don’t value care work and how does...
America Has an Organ Shortage. Could Paying Donors Close the Gap?
There are more than 100,000 people on the waitlist for an organ transplant. Every day 17 of them die. Most organs for transplant come from deceased do...
Why We Choose to Lean into the Discomfort of Making this Podcast
Meet the teams behind Top of Mind and Uncomfy in this special crossover episode, where we share stories of sticking with a challenging perspective whi...
What Will it Take to Rebuild American Trust in Elections?
Only 44% of Americans say they have a "great deal" or "quite a bit of confidence" that the results of the 2024 election will be accurate. But party af...
What Can We Do About America’s Money in Politics Problem?
Presidential elections in the US are twice as expensive as they were just a decade ago, and so are the most competitive Congressional races. Even stat...
Do Jury Trials Work the Way We Want Them To?
A trial by jury is an important American right, enshrined in the 6th and 7th amendments of the constitution. But do jury trials work the way we want...
Funny or Offensive? Why It's So Hard to Draw the Line in Humor
Why is it so hard to draw the line between what’s funny or offensive? We love to laugh and we prize a good sense of humor in ourselves and others. But...
The Changing Ways We Decide Who Gets into College and Why it Matters
For a century, the ACT and SAT played a central role in filtering college applicants. Most colleges and universities stopped requiring standardized te...
Why We’re So Anxious About Retirement in America – And How We Can Fix It
Most Americans are anxious about when – or even if – they’ll be able to retire. And we’re not wrong. Social Security is on shaky footing. Half of Amer...
American roads are dangerous. How can we make them safer?
Compared to other wealthy nations, America has twice as many traffic deaths per capita. And in recent years, pedestrian and cyclist deaths have spiked...
Inside the Changing Role of Fathers in America
What does it mean to be a father in 2024? In the US, the “primary breadwinner dad” is increasingly rare, while the "primary caregiver dad” is becoming...
Why America's Childcare Crisis is an Equation We Can't Seem to Balance
More than two-thirds of children under the age of 6 in the U.S. live in a household where all available parents work. But in most communities, there’s...
Is Our Perception of Crime in America Accurate?
Americans have a perplexing perception of crime. One in three Americans report watching, listening, or reading true crime on a weekly basis. But our f...
Violence, Opioids, Loneliness, Obesity — The Pros and Cons of Treating Social Issues as Epidemics
These days anything that's widespread might be called an "epidemic." Violence, obesity, opioids, even loneliness. But in the public health space, the...
What Does It Mean to Be White in America?
Since 2020 — when George Floyd's murder was seen around the world and protests for racial justice swept the country — many Americans with white skin h...
Bonus Episode: When the People Decide - Putting Money and Power in People’s Hands
We’re in between episodes this week on Top of Mind. In the meantime, we’ve got a story for you from a podcast we think you’re really going to like. It...